Screening for Hazardous Drinking in Nursing Home Residents: Evaluating the Validity of the Current Cutoffs of the Alcohol Use Disorder Identification Test—Consumption Questions by Using Ethyl Glucuronide in Hair

Background Because of physiological changes, elderly people are much more exposed to the adverse effects of alcohol. Therefore, hazardous drinking is defined at lower levels as compared to younger adults. This work aimed to evaluate the validity of the current cutoff levels of the Alcohol Use Disorder Identification Test—Consumption (AUDIT‐C) questions to detect hazardous drinking in the elderly by using ethyl glucuronide in hair (HEtG). Methods In a border region between Austria and Germany, 344 nursing home residents were included from 33 of the 107 nursing homes. Residents were asked to answer the AUDIT‐C questions, hair samples were obtained, and nursing staff members were asked for their assessments of the residents' alcohol consumption. Hair samples were analyzed for HEtG using gas chromatography–mass spectrometry. Receiver‐operating characteristic (ROC) curve analysis was performed to determine the validity of cutoff values for the AUDIT‐C to detect an alcohol consumption of ≥10 g of alcohol/d. Results A total of 11.3% of the nursing home residents (n = 344) drank ≥10 g of alcohol/d (4.9% >60 g of alcohol/d, 6.4% 10 to 60 g of alcohol/d, 88.7%