Prevention of alcohol-related injuries in the Americas: from evidence to policy action

Abstract

[Overview]. This edited volume on alcohol and injuries provides an overview of the burden of alcohol in injuries in the Americas plus research and policy perspectives of the current state of knowledge on alcohol’s association with injuries, based on emergency room (ER) studies in the region. These include studies conducted in Argentina, Brazil, Canada, Dominican Republic, Guatemala, Guyana, Mexico, Nicaragua, Panama, and the United States, over a number of years, using the same methodology and protocol (including probability sampling of injured patients). Therefore, the samples drawn from individual ERs can be considered representative of that ER. While alcohol is known to be highly associated with injury, studies in the Americas are relatively few and the magnitude and diversity of the association across country contexts has not been explored. This book focuses on epidemiologic evidence from ER studies in the region, including those recently supported by the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) in five countries, and addresses issues related to ongoing surveillance, intervention, prevention, and policy strategies aimed at reducing alcohol-related injury. This book is the first to focus on alcohol and injuries in the Americas, and draws on contributions from multiple researchers in the region with broad and long-term experience in this field of study. The terms “emergency room” (ER) and “emergency department” (ED) are used interchangeably throughout the book to refer to facilities that treat injuries of all levels of severity, as opposed to “trauma centers,” which are based within emergency service departments in the United States, and only treat the most severe injuries.