Excessive Drinking

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About

Percentage of adults reporting binge or heavy drinking (age-adjusted). The 2024 Annual Data Release used data from 2021 for this measure.

Excessive drinking is a risk factor for a number of adverse health outcomes, such as alcohol poisoning, high blood pressure, stroke, sexually transmitted diseases, unintended pregnancy, fetal alcohol syndrome, sudden infant death syndrome, suicide, interpersonal violence, and motor vehicle crashes.1 Nearly 1 in 6 adults in the United States are considered binge drinkers.1 Collectively, U.S. adults consume more than 17 billion drinks in binge settings each year.1

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Data and methods

Data Source

Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System

The Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System (BRFSS) is a state-based random digit dial (RDD) telephone survey that is conducted annually in all states, the District of Columbia, and United States territories. Data obtained from the BRFSS are representative of each state’s total non-institutionalized population over 18 years of age and have included more than 400,000 annual respondents with landline telephones or cellphones since 2011. Data are weighted using iterative proportional fitting (also called "raking") methods to reflect population distributions. Data from the BRFSS are used to measure various health behaviors and health-related quality of life (HRQoL) indicators in the Health Snapshots and downloadable datasets. HRQoL measures are age-adjusted to the 2000 U.S. standard population. 

Prior to the 2016 Annual Data Release, up to seven survey years of landline only BRFSS data were aggregated to produce county estimates. However, even with multiple years of data, these did not provide reliable estimates for all counties, particularly those with smaller respondent samples. For the 2016 Annual Data Release and beyond, the CDC produced county estimates using single-year BRFSS data and a multilevel modeling approach based on respondent answers and their age, sex, and race/ethnicity, combined with county-level poverty, as well as county- and state-level contextual effects.1 To produce estimates for those counties where there were no or limited data, the modeling approach borrowed information from the entire BRFSS sample as well as Census Vintage population estimates. CDC used a parametric bootstrapping method to produce standard errors and confidence intervals for those point estimates. This estimation methodology was validated for all U.S. counties, including those with no or small (< 50 respondents) samples.2 This same method was used in constructing the 500 cities study, which includes BRFSS data for the 500 largest cities in the U.S.  

For the 2021 Annual Data Release, the CDC has updated their modeling procedure for producing small-area estimates. With the PLACES project, a multilevel statistical modeling framework using multilevel regression and poststratification (MRP) is performed for small-area estimation that links BRFSS data with high spatial resolution population demographic and socioeconomic data from the Census’ American Community Survey (ACS). The CDC has performed internal and external validation studies, which confirm strong consistency between their model-based estimates and the direct BRFSS survey estimates at both the state and county levels. For more technical information on the PLACES modeling procedure, please see their website.3 

1Zhang X, Holt JB, Lu H, Wheaton AG, Ford ES, Greenlund K, Croft JB. Multilevel regression and poststratification for small-area estimation of population health outcomes: a case study of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease prevalence using the Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System. American Journal of Epidemiology 2014;179(8):1025–1033. 

2Zhang X, Holt JB, Yun, S, Lu H, Greenlund K, Croft JB. Validation of multilevel regression and poststratification methodology for small area estimation of health outcomes. American Journal of Epidemiology 2015;182(2):127-137. 

3PLACES Project. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Accessed March 9, 2021. https://www.cdc.gov/places

Key Measure Methods

Excessive Drinking is a percentage

Excessive Drinking is the percentage of a adults that reports binge or heavy drinking in the past 30 days.

Excessive Drinking estimates are age-adjusted

Age is a non-modifiable risk factor, and binge or heavy drinking may be associated with age. We report an age-adjusted rate in order to fairly compare counties with differing age structures.

The method for calculating Excessive Drinking has changed

Prior to the 2016 Annual Data Release, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's (CDC) Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System (BRFSS) county-level estimates were constructed from seven years of responses from participants who used a landline phone. Beginning with the 2016 Annual Data Release, CDC has provided single-year modeled county-level estimates which include both landline and cell phone users. Beginning with the 2021 Annual Data Release, CDC introduced an updated modeling procedure to produce small-area estimates. This measure has been age-adjusted since the 2021 Annual Data Release. All of these changes were implemented in order to provide users with the most accurate estimates of health in their community. 

Excessive Drinking estimates are created using statistical modeling

Surveys collect information about a limited portion of a population. Statistical modeling can be used to predict how people who share certain characteristics with those surveyed may have responded to the survey. Modeling can increase the power of survey data by generating more stable estimates for places with small numbers of residents or survey responses. The Excessive Drinking estimates are produced from one year of survey data and are created using complex statistical modeling. For more technical information on PLACES modeling using BRFSS data, please see their methodology.2

There are also drawbacks to using modeled data. The smaller the population or sample size of a county, the more the estimates are derived from the model itself and the less they are based on survey responses. Models make assumptions about statistical relationships that may not hold in all cases. Finally, there is no perfect model and each model generally has limitations specific to its methods. 

Caution should be used when comparing these estimates across states

Estimates may not be comparable across states because of methodological changes discussed in “The method for calculating Excessive Drinking has changed”.

Caution should be used when comparing these estimates across years

Estimates may not be comparable across years because of methodological changes discussed in “The method for calculating Excessive Drinking has changed”.

Measure limitations

Using self-reported survey data to assess excessive drinking has limitations. First, excessive drinking is often underreported in surveys because of recall bias, social desirability response bias, and non-response bias.3 Second, BRFSS changed the definition of excessive drinking for women in 2006; this means that there will be a higher prevalence in recent years compared to prior years for women.3 Third, the measure does not include youth drinking prevalence, where 29% of high school students drank alcohol and 11% of young people aged 12-20 years binge drank, all in the past 30 days. Having a measure that includes youth binge drinking would be beneficial for understanding youth drinking patterns in different geographical areas such as states and communities.4 Some states and counties administer a Youth Behavioral Risk Surveillance Survey, but there is not adequate coverage nor sufficiently consistent methodology to aggregate the results for represention of all U.S. counties.5

Numerator

The numerator is the number of adult respondents reporting either binge drinking or heavy drinking. Binge drinking is defined as a woman consuming more than four alcoholic drinks during a single occasion or a man consuming more than five alcoholic drinks during a single occasion. Heavy drinking is defined as a woman drinking more than one drink on average per day or a man drinking more than two drinks on average per day.

Denominator

The denominator is the total number of adult respondents in a county.

Can This Measure Be Used to Track Progress

Modeled estimates have specific drawbacks with their usefulness in tracking progress in communities. Modeled data may not capture the effects of local conditions, such as health promotion policies. In order to better understand and validate modeled estimates, it can be helpful to supplement with additional local data.

Additionally, methodological changes limit the ability to track progress across years using this measure. For more information on methodological changes, see above.

Finding More Data

Disaggregation means breaking data down into smaller, meaningful subgroups. Disaggregated data are often broken down by characteristics of people or where they live. Disaggregated data can reveal inequalities that are otherwise hidden. These data can be disaggregated by:

  • Age
  • Gender
  • Race
  • Education
  • Income
  • Subcounty Area

There are several methods to try to get more specific data than the county level. For larger counties, you can access county- or MSA-specific data from the CDC. However, using these data requires somewhat advanced analytic capabilities.

The PLACES Project provides county-, city-, census tract-, and zip code-level small-area estimates for chronic disease risk factors, health outcomes, and clinical preventive service use, including Excessive Drinking, across the United States.

In many states, you can access county-level BRFSS estimates, and in some cases, you can stratify those estimates by age, gender, income, education, or race.

References

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). Binge drinking. National Center for Chronic Disease and Health Promotion. 2022. Accessed December 21, 2023. https://www.cdc.gov/alcohol/fact-sheets/binge-drinking.htm

2 PLACES: Local data for better health. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, CDC Foundation. Accessed March 9, 2021. https://www.cdc.gov/places

3 Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Sociodemographic differences in binge drinking among adults-14 states, 2004. Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Reports (MMWR). 2009;58:301-304.

4 Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Alcohol and public health—Underage drinking. 2021. Accessed October 26, 2022. https://www.cdc.gov/alcohol/fact-sheets/underage-drinking.htm

5 Miller JW, Naimi TS, Brewer RD, Jones SE. Binge drinking and associated health risk behaviors among high school students. Pediatrics. 2007;119:76-85.