The CAGE Questionnaire: Validation of a New Alcoholism Screening Instrument

Assessment of Smoking Behaviors and Alcohol Use in the National Social Life, Health, and Aging Project

“…The CAGE, a widely used clinical screening instrument that has been used effectively with older adults ( Beullens & Aertgeerts, 2004 ;Friedmann et al, 1999 ), was used to screen for problematic drinking. It is a brief, four-question instrument, which Mayfi eld, Mcleod, and Hall (1974) found easy to administer and less intimidating than the full or shortened version of the Michigan Alcoholism Screening Test ( Pokorny, Miller, & Kaplan, 1972 ;Seltzer, 1971 ). Respondents were asked whether they had ever felt that they should cut down on drinking, whether people had ever annoyed them by criticizing their drinking, whether they had ever felt bad or guilty about drinking, and whether they had ever had a drink fi rst thing in the morning ( eye opener ) to steady their nerves or get rid of a hangover.…”

“…Respondents were asked whether they had ever felt that they should cut down on drinking, whether people had ever annoyed them by criticizing their drinking, whether they had ever felt bad or guilty about drinking, and whether they had ever had a drink fi rst thing in the morning ( eye opener ) to steady their nerves or get rid of a hangover. A total of two or more positive responses have long been used to indicate alcohol abuse and dependence, with the cutpoint based on a sensitivity analysis ( Fiellin, Reid, & O'Connor, 2000 ;Mayfi eld et al, 1974 ). The National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA), in contrast, recommends a screening cutpoint of one positive response for clinical use ( Bradley, Kivlahan, Bush, McDonell, & Fihn, 2001 ;NIAAA, 2005 ), and Friedmann and colleagues (1999) found this cutpoint more suitable for screening elderly hospital emergency department patients.…”

Screening for Alcohol Use in Criminal Justice Settings: An Exploratory Study

“…A wide array of screening methods have been developed to identify problematic alcohol use, including verbal instruments (Mayfield et al, 1974) and questionnaires such as the Alcohol Use Disorders Identification Test (AUDIT) (Saunders et al, 1993), Fast Alcohol Screening Test (FAST) (Hodgson et al, 2002) and Michigan Alcohol Screening Test (MAST) (Selzer, 1971). All of these have an acceptable level of sensitivity and specificity in identifying problematic alcohol use compared with more intensive quantityfrequency measures of excessive drinking and, in addition, questionnaire methods are significantly more effective and cost-effective than biochemical markers associated with alcohol consumption (Coulton et al, 2006).…”

A Comparison of the Alcohol Use Disorder Identification Test (Audit) in General Population Surveys in Nine European Countries

“…Compared with other well-known screening instruments like CAGE (Mayfield et al, 1974), SAAST (Davis et al, 1987), and SMAST (Selzer et al, 1975), the most distinguishing characteristics of the AUDIT are as follows:…”