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Clinicians might be less attentive to at-risk or binge drinking than to clear-cut alcohol dependence in middle-aged and older patients. Yet, binge drinking is associated with negative health consequences (injury, domestic violence, sexually transmitted disease, cardiovascular disease, liver disease, neurological damage, and poor control of diabetes). Because of a hypothesized increase in alcohol use among the baby boomer generation compared with earlier cohorts, these investigators examined drinking data on 6717 individuals aged 50 to 64 (boomers) and 4236 aged 65 or older (older cohort) from the 2005 and 2006 National Surveys on Drug Use and Health.
Binge drinking (≥5 drinks on one occasion at least once in the past month) was reported by 2…