Alcohol Use Disorders: The NICE Guideline on the Diagnosis, Assessment and Management of Harmful Drinking and Alcohol Dependence

This clinical guideline, commissioned by the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE) sets out clear recommendations, based on the best available evidence, for health care professionals on how to work with people with alcohol use disorders, in order to improve their treatment and care. About a quarter of the UK population drink alcohol at a level that is harmful and over 4% are dependent. Alcohol use disorders are also increasing in children and young people. This new guideline reviews the evidence for the diagnosis and assessment of alcohol use disorders, organisation and delivery of care, assisted alcohol withdrawal, and psychological and pharmacological interventions, and includes a chapter on experience of care. It comes with a free CD-ROM that contains all the data used as evidence, including: included and excluded studies, profile tables that summarise both the quality of the evidence and the results of the evidence synthesis, all meta-analytical data, presented as forest plots and detailed information about how to use and interpret forest plots.