Social Workers Play Important Part in Alcohol Screening for Health

Practice

Every year, beginning on Mother’s Day, National Women’s Health Week encourages women of all ages to prioritize their health. Social workers play a valuable role in making alcohol screening, brief intervention, and referral to treatment (SBIRT) part of routine practice for all clients, including women. Females ages 12 and older are the fastest-growing group of alcohol users in the U.S.,
and drinking impacts women’s health at every stage of life.

About half of pregnancies in the U.S. are unplanned, and most women will not know they are pregnant for up to four to six weeks. Any alcohol use during pregnancy can lead to harmful health outcomes, including miscarriage, stillbirth, premature delivery, and sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS). Alcohol-exposed pregnancy also can lead to fetal alcohol spectrum disorders (FASDs), a range of lifelong disabilities that can include mental health conditions, learning disabilities, and physical manifestations such as heart defects.

These statistics were revealed in an NASW Practice blog post written by Diana Ling, MA, senior program manager, and Anna Mangum, MSW, MPH, senior health strategist at the Health Behavior Research and Training Institute at the University of Texas at Austin School of Social Work. More than 40 years of research shows alcohol screening and brief intervention works to reduce risky alcohol use.