PREVALENCE OF ALCOHOL-IMPAIRED DRIVING - RESULTS FROM A NATIONAL SELF-REPORTED SURVEY OF HEALTH BEHAVIORS

Objective.-To estimate how frequently adults in the United States driv e while impaired by alcohol. Design.-Telephone survey. Setting-The 49 states (and the District of Columbia) that participated in the Behavio ral Risk Factor Surveillance System (BRFSS) in 1993. Participants.-A t otal of 102 263 noninstitutionalized adults aged 18 years or older. Ma in Outcome Measures.-The percentage of respondents who reported alcoho l-impaired driving; number of episodes of alcohol-impaired driving per 1 000 adult population; and total number of episodes of alcohol-impai red driving-each by age, sex, race, level of education, and state. Res ults.-Overall, 2.5% of adults reported an estimated 123 million episod es of alcohol-impaired driving in 1993, This corresponds to 655 episod es of alcohol-impaired driving for each 1000 adults (range among state s per 1000 adults, 165-1550). Alcohol-impaired driving was most freque nt among men aged 21 to 34 years (1739 episodes per 1 000 adults) and was nearly as frequent among men aged 18 to 20 years (1623 episodes pe r 1000 adults), despite legislation in all states that prohibited the sale of alcohol to persons younger than age 21 years in 1993. Conclusi ons.-Alcohol-impaired driving is common even among underage persons. S trict enforcement of laws that discourage alcohol-impaired driving is needed along with community and patient education to reduce the preval ence of alcohol-impaired driving and prevent injuries and deaths from alcohol-related motor vehicle crashes. Data From the BRFSS, an ongoing source of national and state-specific data on the number of episodes of alcohol-impaired driving, are potentially useful for monitoring tre nds and evaluating the effect of future efforts to reduce alcohol-impa ired driving.