Background: There were nearly 33,000 admissions to Department of Veterans Affairs hospitals for alcohol withdrawal syndrome (AWS) in fiscal year 2017. Symptom-triggered management is the standard of care and, when employed effectively, the number of medication doses during admission is a good proxy for clinical severity of withdrawal. Several evidence-based algorithms for outpatient management of [...]

Background: Affecting approximately 5.9% of the US population, alcohol use disorder (AUD) has been established as a prevalent disease in this country (1). Through repeated hospital admissions for alcohol use disorder (including alcohol withdrawal syndromes), hospital costs have steadily risen to recent estimates of 7.6 billion dollars in 2017 (2). Without the establishment of outpatient [...]

Background: There were nearly 33,000 admissions to Department of Veterans Affairs hospitals for alcohol withdrawal syndrome (AWS) in fiscal year 2017. Symptom-triggered management is the standard of care and, when employed effectively, the number of medication doses during admission is a good proxy for clinical severity of withdrawal. Several evidence-based algorithms for outpatient management of [...]

Background: Affecting approximately 5.9% of the US population, alcohol use disorder (AUD) has been established as a prevalent disease in this country (1). Through repeated hospital admissions for alcohol use disorder (including alcohol withdrawal syndromes), hospital costs have steadily risen to recent estimates of 7.6 billion dollars in 2017 (2). Without the establishment of outpatient [...]

Background: Alcohol use disorder (AUD) Is present in 10% of adults and its prevalence is increasing. When patients with AUD are admitted to the hospital, half develop alcohol withdrawal syndrome (AWS), which can cause delirium, hallucinations, seizures, and even mortality if not treated appropriately. A fixed-dose phenobarbital strategy may be superior to the standard of [...]

Background: Approximately 5% of patients hospitalized at our institution develop clinically significant alcohol withdrawal syndrome (AWS). Inpatients who develop AWS may experience seizures, delirium, ICU transfer and prolonged length of stay. While the mortality of AWS, mostly related to delirium tremens, has decreased over time, severe alcohol withdrawal is still associated with a mortality of [...]