‘One Drink One Click’ app launch
3 March 2015
A new mobile application has been launched to make the Welsh public 'stop and think' about their level of alcohol consumption.
Public Health Wales, in partnership with Alcohol Concern, has developed the 'One Drink One Click' app to help people anonymously monitor how much they are drinking.
The online platform will also be used as a resource for the 'Have a Word' programme, developed by Cardiff University, which motivates health professionals to offer health advice at times when patients are most receptive.
Users can input the number of alcoholic drinks consumed, find out how many units this equates to and measure their data against healthy consumption guidelines.
Professor Jonathan Shepherd, Director of the Violence and Society Research Group and Professor of Oral and Maxillofacial surgery at Cardiff University's School of Dentistry, said: "The new 'One Drink One Click' app is an important part of the 'Have a Word' initiative, which aims to reduce the heavy toll of alcohol misuse in Wales and more widely."
The 'Have a Word' brand was created and developed by Cardiff University's Violence and Society Research Group after trials showed that advice given in precise ways that capitalise on "teachable moments" in people's lives, such as when stitches are being removed, cut drinking to less dangerous levels.
The 'Have a Word' training programme was launched by the Wales health minister, Leslie Griffiths AM, in 2012. Public Health Wales has so far trained over 7,000 people in how to 'Have a Word' with patients, colleagues, friends and family in a positive, constructive way when their level of drinking becomes a risk.
The 'One Drink One Click' app is currently available to download for free in the App Store.
Users will be asked to input data on their level of alcohol consumption and based on this data will receive information on the number of units this contains and their level of health risk.
The data provided through the app is anonymous. Public Health Wales may access the data to help them understand alcohol use in Wales unless the user has opted out.
The 'One Drink One Click' app is available to download at http://appstore.com/onedrinkoneclick.