Alcoholic

Moderate drinking

A follow-up study, using the same subjects that were judged to be in remission in 2001–2002, examined the rates of return to problem drinking in 2004–2005. The study found abstinence from alcohol was the most stable form of remission for recovering alcoholics. There was also a 1973 study showing chronic alcoholics drinking moderately again, but a 1982 follow-up showed that 95% of subjects were not able to maintain drinking in moderation over the long term. Another study was a long-term (60 year) follow-up of two groups of alcoholic men which concluded that "return to controlled drinking rarely persisted for much more than a decade without relapse or evolution into abstinence." Internet based measures appear to be useful at least in the short term.