Educational Intervention for Older Adults

Using An Educational Intervention to Reduce Alcohol Consumption Among Older Adults

An estimated 60% of adults between 65 to 75 years report consuming alcohol. According to Ettner et al. (2014) drinking does decline as age advances, but there are increased risks associated with drinking for older adults compared to younger adults. Older adults take numerous medications that might counteract alcohol, impairing their judgment and physiology. While the recommendation for older adults is to reduce their consumption or abstain completely, there is still a high prevalence of older adults who consume alcohol. With the ever-growing number of older adults, there is a likelihood there will be an increased number of older adults who consume alcohol, increasing healthcare costs.

With an estimated 20% of the population aged 65 years or older by 2030, there is a need to ensure alcohol consumption is reduced, leading to reduced healthcare costs (Ettner et al., 2014). The use of an educational intervention to reduce at-risk drinking is beneficial to the population because we will have a healthier older population, and healthcare costs used for their treatment can be redirected to other vital areas. At-risk drinkers are identified as those who consume four or more per occasion at least weekly, take sedatives three to four times a week and consume two drinks per day, or consume two drinks a week and have memory problems.

Whenever an intervention is implemented to assist in alcohol reduction amongst older adults, there is a reduction in alcohol consumption. At-risk-drinkers tend to reduce when educated on the risk of alcohol when combined with other medications or symptoms. The overall goal of the educational intervention is to reduce or lower alcohol consumption reducing the risks associated with alcohol consumption. There have been significant declines in physician visits associated with reduced alcohol consumption. It is predicted that there will be 1.14 fewer physician visits in a follow-up year after the educational intervention, indicating fewer healthcare costs associated with the intervention (Ettner et al., 2014).

Though the educational intervention is deemed effective in reducing all categories of at-risk drinking, no significant improvements were observed in driving after drinking. Therefore, there might be a need for a different intervention targeting this particular risk behavior. Further analysis can determine why an educational intervention is ineffective in modifying driving after drinking behavior. The underlying issue causing patients not to change their behavior could be their lack of means to take them home after drinking. An alternative method for rectifying the behavior should be developed. Strategies like education on the risks of drunk driving and its impact on the individual and others could effectively reduce driving after drinking for older adults (Conde-Sala et al., 2017) . Also, we can increase awareness campaigns for driving after drinking targeting the younger generation to ensure they do not continue with the behavior when they age.

While the information we have regarding the efficacy of educational intervention for alcohol reduction amongst older adults focuses more on White individuals, the same can be replicated for other races. However, further analysis can be done to determine if the length and strategy used for the education are applicable and suitable for the individuals. As the author posits, the conclusions made from the study cannot be generalized to other settings since the study participants comprised primarily white older adults. Attempts to generalize the study would be futile, considering older adults from other populations might have different needs and requirements than well-off White older Americans.

In determining what works best for older adults, we need to compare results from other studies and determine their effectiveness. The Project SHARE intervention works best because it relies on a low-intensity intervention maintained over a long period (Ettner et al., 2014). Such a strategy works best because it keeps reinforcing the same message in a subtle long-term manner. Other studies that have attempted the same strategy had the same results demonstrating the importance of an educational intervention for reducing alcohol use in older adults (Fink et al., 2005). The most interesting finding was discovering the additional benefits gained by participants where they had lower use of health care services.

It is vital to understand why the individuals who consume alcohol in large quantities do so to determine how to assist them and structure the educational materials to fit their needs. There might be presenting problems surrounding the individual that cause them to result to alcohol instead of dealing with the underlying problem. For example, to better understand why the educational intervention is ineffective in reducing driving after drinking cases, we should focus on the individuals who drive after drinking and question why they do so. We should understand that a person’s behavior is a product of their environment. Therefore, environmental issues might cause the person to behave as they do, and without addressing them, we cannot assist the individual in modifying their behavior.

To replicate the findings for other races and communities, we should first understand the people’s environment. Regardless of race, the educational materials should be tailored to the individual and not use generic materials. An analysis of the psychological and social constructs of alcohol use among older adults should be done. Drinking does reduce with advancing age (Ettner et al., 2014), and for those older adults who do not reduce their drinking, there might be social and psychological constructs making them continue to consume alcohol. Addiction comes to mind since there is no other explanation for overconsumption of alcohol as one age. Alcohol consumption could be a social aspect for the individual because they have no friends and find it easy to hang out at the bar to socialize. Without much to do, the older adult finds they have loads of free time, pushing them to alcohol consumption as their way to pass the time.