The role of the community psychiatric nurse in improving treatment compliance in alcoholics.

Patient compliance in alcoholism treatment remains an under-researched topic. Some factors as to why patients comply to treatment have been studied but the intervention of nursing staff who work in the community has not been extensively researched. This study looks at the effect, if any, of having community psychiatric nurses following up a randomly-selected group of new patients referred to the Withington Hospital Alcoholism Treatment Unit. This study looks at the involvement of community psychiatric nurses in their initial treatment.