During my 3 weeks of emergency medicine elective, I noticed a lot of alcoholics (coincidentally most are middle aged to elderly Indian gentlemen and ironically, some have Muslim names [disclaimer: this is a personal observation. I do not intend to discriminate against Indians and Muslims. I, instead, wish to remind the medics to consider alcohol intoxication in people from such demographic groups presenting with altered mental state, but also keeping in mind that Indians have higher risks of coronary and cerebrovascular events.

Anyway, we have certain biological markers useful in evaluating and managing an alcoholic patient.

1. GGT: gamma glutamyl transferase: rises significantly after heavy alcohol consumption for 1-2 months. requires abstinence of about one month before GGT normalizes. This is thus useful for assessing long term abstinence
2. CDT: carbohydrate deficient transferrin: like GGT, its level rises after heavy alcohol consumption, but earlier than GGT at half a month. In addition, unlike GGT, elevated CDT is more specific than elevated GGT for heavy alcohol consumption as other hepatic conditions may result in raised GGT.
3. MCV: MCV raised after heavy alcohol consumption for 1 to 2 months
4. FAEE: fatty acid ethyl esters:
5. ?thrombocytopaenia?