Following last year’s success at the Irish Healthcare Awards, UCC’s Dr Michael Byrne believes momentum is gathering to have a sector-wide approach to the issue of alcohol misuse among students. Dara Gantly reports.
At last year’s Irish Healthcare Awards, UCC Health Matters went home with both the Best Public Health Initiative trophy and the overall An Duais Mhór award for its comprehensive Alcohol Action Plan.
Aimed at reducing levels of alcohol-related harm among students, the multifaceted plan has seen the introduction of such diverse measures as an online brief intervention tool for all incoming first years, intervention training for frontline college staff, alcohol information sessions and awareness events on campus, newly trained peer-support leaders to encourage alcohol education, and most recently the provision of alcohol-free accommodation on campus.
With 20 specific actions, the plan emerged after the college had found that 45 per cent of its students reported binge drinking more than once a week. According to Head of UCC’s Student Health Department Dr Michael Byrne, the adverse consequences of such misuse were very real, all too common, and occasionally had been very serious, up to and including devastating injury and death.
But the tide, he believes, has started to turn. Speaking this week to Irish Medical Times, Dr Byrne said winning the top prize at last year’s Awards certainly raised the profile of their project, with many other third-level institutions becoming aware of the work. Indeed, he believed momentum was gathering to try to have a sector-wide approach to the issue, using some of UCC’s proven methodology.
Umbrella organisation
“The work became more visible nationally at both the Irish Student Health Association level — which is the umbrella organisation of student health departments — as well as within the umbrella organisation for professional support services, the Confederation of Student Services in Ireland.”
And at an institutional level, Dr Byrne highlighted the work being started at Cork Institute of Technology, IT Tralee, NUI Galway, Letterkenny IT, and Dublin Institute of Technology. “Beyond the third-level sector, we also got an opportunity to showcase the work at the National Alcohol Forum in the Dublin Convention Centre, highlighting it to a wider community,” he told IMT.
Source: Dara Gantly, Irish Medical Times, 18/06/14
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