Efficacy of an alcoholism self-report questionnaire in a residency clinic.

The efficacy of the CAGE alcoholism screening test, when used as a part of a much larger health and social history questionnaire, was assessed in a family medicine residency clinic by retrospectively studying 155 charts of randomly selected adult patients. The rate of problem drinking, as determined by the CAGE, was then compared with the rate found in other studies using the CAGE questionnaire. The CAGE responses were also compared with other information in the patients' charts to assess how frequently this screening test might support a diagnosis of problem drinking. The incidence of problem drinking identified by the CAGE was 3.2 percent, compared with the expected 9.8 percent level (P = .0039). The CAGE questionnaire proved to be no better than a simple self-report of alcohol consumption (which demonstrated an incidence of 4 percent), and failed to identify two patients with histories of alcohol abuse as noted in their charts. CAGE, when used as a part of a larger health questionnaire, thus failed to identify the anticipated number of patients with drinking problems.