Huge increase in drunken patients

Figures for patients over the drink-drive alcohol limit have soared

The number of patients over the drink-drive limit at a Northern Ireland hospital has risen 113% in five years, according to a new study.

Tests on patients arriving at Belfast City Hospital showed that drunk men outnumbered drunk women, but the number of intoxicated women almost doubled.

The study in the Emergency Medicine Journal said that among the under-16s, there were more drunk girls than boys.

A doctor said someone was brought in most weeks in an alcoholic coma.

Peter Allely, a Specialist Registrar in Emergency Medicine, and one of the report's authors, said having drunk people in the department was stressful.

"It makes for an unpleasant and stressful environment for staff and also a potentially dangerous environment because these people have lost their inhibitions and may well become violent and frequently do," he said.

He said someone being brought in in a coma was "at least a weekly occurrence in most emergency departments in Northern Ireland".

The study covered two periods between September 1999 and August 2000 and from September 2003 to August 2004.

It showed that the number of intoxicated women almost doubled, from 203 to 401 during the study period.

The authors, who are based at Belfast City Hospital, said: "This paper supports the impression that there are more intoxicated people presenting to emergency departments.

"We feel that alternative reasons for such increases in our department, such as more blood samples being sent off by nursing staff, would not account for such dramatic changes."

Drunk men outnumbered drunk women, although the number of intoxicated women doubled over the study period, from 203 to 401 Emergency Medical Journal

They added that more research was needed to assess levels across all UK hospitals.

The number of patients with blood alcohol above 80mg/100ml - the legal limit for drivers - rose 113% across the study period, from 526 to 1,124.

Figures for those with alcohol levels above 480mg/100ml rose from five to 29, an increase of 480%.

The highest blood alcohol level recorded was 750mg per 100ml of blood.

The annual number of tests requested rose from 825 to 2,031, an increase of 146%, the study found.

Tests on those aged under the age of 26 were recorded as being up 169%, from 97 to 261.