Looking at the rate of alcohol-related hospital admissions during the week of someone’s birthday, there was a huge spike around 19th birthdays – the minimum legal drinking age.
Research Assistant Jodi Gatley says what was surprising was a larger increase for women than men.
“For males, there was a 114% increase in alcohol-related admissions and for females there was a 154% increase,” she says. “The second largest spikes were at the 20th, 21st, and 22nd birthdays for both males and females. We also found a slightly lower spike at the 30th birthday.”
Gatley says men tend to have a higher proportion of binge drinking than women, so the larger increase for hospital admissions in women was slightly unexpected.
The study also looked at hospital admission rates for teen birthdays, which showed an increase for girls starting as young as 14 years old, and boys at 16 years old.
The research was done along with UNBC’s Dr. Russ Callaghan (pictured) gathering information by analyzing hospital admissions in Ontario between 2002 and 2007.