Alcoholism as a disease
Posted on:1/9/2006
| The American Psychiatric Association no longer recognizes the existence of "alcoholism" as a diagnostic category per se. |
The American Psychiatric Association no longer recognizes the existence of "alcoholism" as a diagnostic category per se. With the publication of the DSM-III in 1980, two separate syndromes of alcohol dependence and alcohol abuse replace the earlier category. Although the word "alcoholism" survives in popular usage and in the literature of certain groups such as Alcoholics Anonymous, the medical community recognizes the term through those two syndromes. The World Health Organization also dropped the diagnostic category "alcoholism" in 1979, replacing it with the diagnostic categories "alcohol dependence" and "harmful use" (ICD-9, ICD-10). The American Hospital Association, the American Public Health Association, the National Association of Social Workers, and the American College of Physicians classify "alcoholism" as a disease.