Brief Interventions for Alcohol Use and Related Problems

Brief interventions are an important component of alcohol treatment. They are brief psychosocial interventions that include screening and assessment feedback, and the provision of counselling and information to achieve a reduction in alcohol use and/or alcohol-related problems. Most recent definitions of brief interventions use motivational interviewing (MI) techniques to achieve these goals (also covered in Chapter 9). Brief interventions are delivered in a time-limited way, ranging from one to four sessions of between 5 and 30 minutes.

Opportunistic brief interventions are offered to people who have not sought treatment for alcohol use, but present to other settings (e.g., emergency departments, general practice) with alcohol-related illnesses, injuries and/or problems. Routine screening is sometimes used in these settings to identify people drinking at risky levels, who may or may not have experienced alcohol-related problems. Such interventions aim to increase people’s awareness that they are drinking at risky levels, and encourage them to decrease their drinking to prevent or reduce their risk of alcohol-related harm.

Brief interventions are also offered to people seeking help for alcohol-related problems. They can be delivered as a standalone treatment or as a motivational prelude to pharmacological (see Chapter 10) and/or more intensive psychosocial alcohol treatment (see Chapter 9). They are also offered as the initial step, in stepped care models of healthcare, in which those who do not respond to a brief intervention, are stepped up to more intensive alcohol treatment. Brief MI interventions are also delivered as part of integrated interventions in which they are combined with more intensive psychosocial treatments for alcohol, such as cognitive behaviour therapy (CBT).