Intensity of Binge Drinking a Decade After the September 11th Terror Attacks Among Exposed Individuals

The Intentional Self-Medication of 9/11-Related PTSD Symptoms with Alcohol: 15 Years after the Disaster

“…When parsed out by the number of PTSD symptom clusters endorsed, the enrollees who reported ISMA consistently had the highest proportions of high-frequency binge drinking compared to those who did not report ISMA, irrespective of the number of PTSD symptom clusters endorsed. This finding supports those of previous studies on binge drinking within similarly exposed populations [8,[49][50][51][52]. Given their highly robust association in our sample population, it may be that binge drinking intensity could approximate ISMA intensity.…”

“…For instance, Keyes et al [7] found that alcohol consumption increased in population samples directly exposed to 9/11 in the months after the event, and over the longer term for those with higher exposure levels. Another study also demonstrated an increased prevalence, frequency, and intensity of binge drinking among those directly exposed to the 9/11 attacks [8] and the among survivors of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita [9]. Comorbidity of PTSD and increased alcohol use is well documented in trauma-exposed populations is [10][11][12][13][14][15][16].…”

“…Variables previously found to be associated with alcohol use were included as potential confounders: binge drinking behavior, history of an alcohol or drug problem, demographic variables (described below), depressive disorder, social support, social integration, and quality of life [8,30].…”

Change in binge drinking behavior after Hurricane Sandy among persons exposed to the 9/11 World Trade Center disaster

“…Covariates shown to be associated with binge drinking in the literature were included in the analyses ( Naimi et al, 2003 , Welch et al, 2017 ). Sex and race/ethnicity were collected at the Wave 1 survey, age at Sandy survey was derived from Sandy survey, and annual household income in 2015 was collected at the Wave 4 survey.…”

“…However, there is no consensus about the duration of increased alcohol use after a traumatic event (Keyes, 2013). Some studies ( Chou et al, 2007 , Welch et al, 2017 ) concluded that the effect can last for years after a traumatic event, while other studies found that the association between disaster exposure and binge drinking observed soon after the disaster was short-term, in that the effect of increased alcohol use was not detected beyond a year following the disaster ( Boscarino et al, 2006 , Nordløkken et al, 2016 ). Importantly, most of these studies were conducted retrospectively, thus the findings were likely subject to recall bias ( Nordløkken et al, 2013 ).…”