Welcome to the Effectiveness Bank Bulletin, an update service provided by the Drug and Alcohol 
Findings project. This service alerts you to recent evaluation studies with important practice 
implications. Though tailored for the UK, this selection will be of international interest.

***A DIFFERENT KIND OF BULLETIN***
Up to now we've only brought you the few new studies we've been able to fully analyse, a very select 
minority of well over a thousand research papers we collect and assess each year. Now we'll be 
opening the doors wider on that database, enabling you to gain greater benefit from the work put in 
to maintaining it. We'll alert you to EVERY new study assessed as particularly relevant to UK 
practice and policy - and often that means to practice and policy worldwide - immediately and 
whether or not we later conduct a more extended analysis.
The entries give you the abstract and brief comments from us, plus links to order copies of the full 
article or (if we have a current e-mail address) to ask the author for a free reprint. Don't be shy 
of the latter - it very often meets with an appreciative response and authors are provided with 
reprints for this very purpose. For the first time too, each entry ends with the top ten most 
closely related documents in our collection. Unlike fixed links, these are fed afresh each time from 
the database so are always up to date. We like the idea of this new bulletin format - it means more 
of what we do benefits you directly, and can benefit your patients, clients, young people and 
communities. Let us know if it works for you.
To view click on a link or paste in to your web browser's address box, being sure to enter the whole 
address. This link
http://findings.org.uk/count/downloads/download.php?file=bulletins/Bull_08_12_08.php
takes you to the bulletin as a whole. The links below take you to your chosen entry.

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ALCOHOL HEALTH SERVICES IN ENGLAND: GLASS LESS THAN HALF FULL BUT BEING TOPPED UP
Official audit of work by the Department of Health and NHS to address the health effects of alcohol 
misuse. Describes a system whose infrastructure is clearly inadequate compared to the size of the 
task, but one recently taking steps in the right direction. How far it has to go is illustrated by 
the gap between the treatment spend per dependent drinker versus drug user - £197 v. £1744 ...
http://findings.org.uk/count/downloads/download.php?file=bulletins/Bull_08_12_08.php#NAO_2.txt

HOW TO ASSESS PROGRESS IN IMPLEMENTING SCREENING AND BRIEF ALCOHOL INTERVENTIONS
Having mandated universal screening for alcohol problems, the US health system for ex-military 
personnel here thoughtfully addresses how to measure the degree to which this led to appropriate 
implementation of brief interventions, an essential step in driving up coverage ...
http://findings.org.uk/count/downloads/download.php?file=bulletins/Bull_08_12_08.php#Bradley_KA_2.txt

FIRST FULL-SCALE ATTEMPT TO IMPLEMENT UNIVERSAL SCREENING FOR DRUG AS WELL AS ALCOHOL PROBLEMS
This huge US study set out to test whether widespread screening and brief intervention for illegal 
drug use (as well as heavy drinking) could be implemented in a variety of general medical settings, 
and whether it was effective. Both tests seem to have been passed by a large margin, but there are 
some important caveats ...
http://findings.org.uk/count/downloads/download.php?file=bulletins/Bull_08_12_08.php#Madras_BK_1.txt

AA HELPS MOST WHEN PATIENT'S FRIENDS AND FAMILY FAVOUR DRINKING
Bottom line from this re-analysis of the multi-million $ US Project MATCH alcohol treatment trial: 
when a patient's closest friends/family drink and support drinking, help them recruit a social 
circle with the opposite characteristics. When they already have this, it's best to focus instead on 
the reasons (such as motivational or skills deficits) why they nevertheless drink excessively ...
http://findings.org.uk/count/downloads/download.php?file=bulletins/Bull_08_12_08.php#Wu_J_1.txt

GP SCREENING FOR RISKY DRINKING RIVALS FLU JABS FOR HEALTH GAIN PER £
How does screening for risky drinking and offering brief advice rank in terms of health gains 
against other preventive programmes? Important, because there simply isn't time to do them all - you 
have to choose. In this comprehensive analysis, it was estimated to be among the most cost-effective 
services GPs could offer, ranking alongside screening for high blood pressure or immunisation 
against influenza ...
http://findings.org.uk/count/downloads/download.php?file=bulletins/Bull_08_12_08.php#Solberg_LI_1.txt

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FINDINGS is managed by DrugScope, Alcohol Concern and the National Addiction Centre, the two leading 
UK drug and alcohol information charities and the UK's leading clinical/research centre. The 
Effectiveness Bank project is supported by the J. Paul Getty Jr. Charitable Trust 
(http://www.jpgettytrust.org.uk) and the Pilgrim Trust (http://www.thepilgrimtrust.org.uk).