Revista Brasileira em Promoção da Saúde (Dec 2012)
Binge drinking among university students
Abstract
Objective: To investigate the consumption of alcoholic beverages by college students, with an emphasis on practicing alcoholic binge. Methods: We selected randomly 102 students enrolled in different courses at a public university located in the city of Fortaleza. Alcohol consumption and socioeconomic data were investigated with a form. We evaluated both alcohol abuse by transforming the intake in grams of ethanol, such as the presence of alcoholic binge. The statistical package SPSS version 16.0 was used as an operational tool for data analysis, adopting p <0.05 significance level. Results: From the students assessed, 52 (51%) were male and 50 (49%) were female with a mean age of 21.9 ± 1.9 years. The prevalence of alcohol consumption was 29.4% (n = 30). The binge was observed in 64.7% (n = 11) of men and 46.2% (n = 6) women. The average ethanol intake on each occasion of consumption was 125.4 ± 92g for men and 61.5 ± 42.3 g of ethanol among women, with statistical difference (p = 0.008). Conclusions: The prevalence of alcohol consumption was low, although the binge has been high, especially among men, putting the group at risk to health, demanding the realization of educational activities.
