Current and life-time alcohol consumption in Iranian students: a systematic review and meta-analysis

ABSTRACT

Background

The present systematic review and meta-analysis were aimed to assess the current and lifetime prevalence of alcohol consumption among school and university students in Iran.

Method

Online databases including Web of Science, PubMed, Scopus, Embase, and domestic scientific databases including SID, Magiran, IRANDOC, RICeST were searched systematically from inception to December 2019, using Persian and English languages. Following a random-effects meta-analysis, we estimated the pooled current and lifetime prevalence of alcohol consumption among school and university students in Iran. Heterogeneity was assessed with the Cochran Q statistic and quantified with the I² statistic.

Results

Of the 319 identified records, 64 articles met the inclusion criteria. The students’ overall pooled prevalence of current and lifetime alcohol consumption was 11.7% (95% CI, 10.0–13.4) and 14.5% (95% CI, 12.1–16.9), respectively. Prevalence of current and lifetime alcohol consumption among school students were 15.2% (95% CI, 7.8–11.5), and 15.4% (95% CI, 12.5–18.4) respectively, prevalence of current and lifetime alcohol consumption in university students were 9.7% (95% CI, 7.8–11.5), 13.7% (95% CI, 10.3–17.2) respectively.

Conclusions

Based on findings, it seems necessary to implement and formulate primary and comprehensive prevention strategies and policies based on various cultures, regions, geographies, ages, and ethnicity.

KEYWORDS:

• Alcohol consumption
• prevalence
• current prevalence
• lifetime prevalence
• student

Authors’ contribution

M.N, N.S and L.J had equal contribution in designing the paper. M.K had contribution in writing search syntax and searching in databases for eligible studies. N.S, M.M extracted the data, S.E.K and M.P re-checked the extracted data. S.GH and L.GH analyzed the data, N.S, S.E.K had cooperation in drafting of the manuscript and M.N supervised the project and had critical revision of the manuscript and approval of the article. All authors reviewed and have given approval to the final version of manuscript.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Ethics Approval and Consent to Participate

The study was approved by the Research Ethics Committee of Iran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran (IR.IUMS.REC.1397.1252).

Availability of Data and Material

All data generated or analyzed during the current study are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.

Supplementary material

Supplemental data for this article can be accessed online at https://doi.org/10.1080/14659891.2022.2114386.

Additional information

Funding

This research was supported by [Systematic Review Network Grant Number 13919] from Iran University of Medical Sciences.