Psychometric properties of the Alcohol Use Disorders Identification Test (AUDIT) and prevalence of alcohol use among Iranian psychiatric outpatients

Simasadat Noorbakhsh,Jamal Shams,Hanieh Zahiroddin,Hakan Kallmen,Mats Hallgren,Mohamadmahdi Faghihimohamadi

doi:10.1186/s13011-018-0141-x

Abstract

BackgroundIran is a developing and Islamic country where the consumption of alcoholic beverages is banned. However, psychiatric disorders and alcohol use disorders are often co-occurring. We used the Alcohol Use Disorders Identification Test (AUDIT) to estimate the prevalence of alcohol use and examined the psychometric properties of the test among psychiatric outpatients in Teheran, Iran.MethodsAUDIT was completed by 846 consecutive (sequential) patients. Descriptive statistics, internal consistency (Cronbach alpha), confirmatory and exploratory factor analyses were used to analyze the prevalence of alcohol use, reliability and construct validity.Results12% of men and 1% of women were hazardous alcohol consumers. Internal reliability of the Iranian version of AUDIT was excellent. Confirmatory factor analyses showed that the construct validity and the fit of previous factor structures (1, 2 and 3 factors) to data were not good and seemingly contradicted results from the explorative principal axis factoring, which showed that a 1-factor solution explained 77% of the co-variances.ConclusionsWe could not reproduce the suggested factor structure of AUDIT, probably due to the skewed distribution of alcohol consumption. Only 19% of men and 3% of women scored above 0 on AUDIT. This could be explained by the fact that alcohol is illegal in Iran. In conclusion the AUDIT exhibited good internal reliability when used as a single scale. The prevalence estimates according to AUDIT were somewhat higher among psychiatric patients compared to what was reported by WHO regarding the general population.

Highlights

in Tehran (Iran) is a developing and Islamic country where the consumption of alcoholic beverages is banned
In 2011 the Iranian household Mental Health survey was conducted. It showed that the 12 month prevalence of alcohol consumption in the Iranian population aged between 15 and 64 years was 5.7% and that the prevalence of Alcohol Use Disorder (AUD), according to DSM-5, was 1.3% [13]
The present study demonstrated that the prevalence of alcohol consumers among male and female Iranian psychiatric outpatients was 19 and 3.1%, respectively

Summary

Introduction

Iran is a developing and Islamic country where the consumption of alcoholic beverages is banned. Alcohol Use Disorder (AUD) is one of the most prevalent psychiatric disorders and is associated with considerable disability [1]. It causes a heavy financial burden on health systems [2]. In 2011 the Iranian household Mental Health survey was conducted It showed that the 12 month prevalence of alcohol consumption in the Iranian population aged between 15 and 64 years was 5.7% and that the prevalence of AUD, according to DSM-5, was 1.3% [13]. The 12 month prevalence of alcohol consumption in the Iranian population was estimated to be 2.31%, but in young men aged 18–30 years it was estimated at 7% [14]

Methods

Results

Discussion

Conclusion