The study investigates how teaching healthcare workers brief-intervention changes their attitudes. Evidence shows that negative therapeutic attitudes hinder implementation of best practice.

The attitudes are measured by AAPPQ, ABS and SPATR in this randomised controlled trial. The sample was randomised into 2 arms (control and intervention) and followed up after 9 months. The intervention group consisted 2 interventions namely teaching ASSIST and distributing alcohol brochures for self-learning. Pre- and post-intervention measurements were analysed using the Student's T-test with a change of 20% taken to be statistically significant at p-value of < 0.05.

The pre- and post-intervention sample comprised mainly Chinese female staff-nurses who worked less than 5 years and had no training in brief-interventions. Before intervention, the sample was neutral in their attitudes and adopted a disease model of belief towards alcohol problems. Following intervention, the sample showed positive changes in their therapeutic attitudes with the ASSIST sub-group achieving a statistically significant positive shift in both the score of Role-Adequacy and Role- Legitimacy. The sample also adopted a free-will model of belief after intervention. The ASSIST sub-group reported the greatest shift of 76.3% (p< 0.05). The ASSIST intervention sub-group became more aware about the availability of counseling materials and training programs for early-interventions.

Teaching brief-interventions made positive changes to the therapeutic attitudes of healthcare workers with more robust effects from teaching ASSIST. A shift in the model of belief may indicate stigma and denial of the presence of alcohol problem and this may warrant continuous research and work in this area.