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. 2017 Oct 5;17(1):789.
doi: 10.1186/s12889-017-4811-9.

Queensland Alcohol-related violence and Night Time Economy Monitoring project (QUANTEM): a study protocol

Peter G Miller  1 , Jason Ferris  2 , Kerri Coomber  3 , Renee Zahnow  2 , Nicholas Carah  4 , Heng Jiang  5 , Kypros Kypri  6 , Tanya Chikritzhs  7 , Alan Clough  8 , Michael Livingston  5 , Dominique de Andrade  9 , Robin Room  5 , Sarah Callinan  5 , Ashlee Curtis  3 , Richelle Mayshak  3 , Nicolas Droste  3 , Belinda Lloyd  10 , Sharon Matthews  10 , Nicholas Taylor  3 , Meredythe Crane  11 , Michael Thorn  11 , Jake Najman  12
Affiliations

Queensland Alcohol-related violence and Night Time Economy Monitoring project (QUANTEM): a study protocol

Peter G Miller et al. BMC Public Health. .

Abstract

Background: Alcohol-related harm is a substantial burden on the community in Australia and internationally, particularly harm related to risky drinking practices of young people in the night-time economy. This protocol paper describes a study that will report on the changes in a wide range of health and justice outcome measures associated with major policy changes in the state of Queensland, Australia. A key element includes trading hours restrictions for licensed premises to 2 am for the state and 3 am in Safe Night Precincts (SNPs). Other measures introduced include drinks restrictions after midnight, increased patron banning measures for repeat offenders, mandatory ID scanning of patrons in late-night venues, and education campaigns.

Methods: The primary aim of the study is to evaluate change in the levels of harm due to these policy changes using administrative data (e.g., police, hospital, ambulance, and court data). Other study elements will investigate the impact of the Policy by measuring foot traffic volume in SNPs, using ID scanner data to quantify the volume of people entering venues and measure the effectiveness of banning notices, using patron interviews to quantify the levels of pre-drinking, intoxication and illicit drug use within night-time economy districts, and to explore the impacts of the Policy on business and live music, and costs to the community.

Discussion: The information gathered through this project aims to evaluate the effectiveness of the Policy and to draw on these findings to inform future prevention and enforcement approaches by policy makers, police, and venue staff.

Keywords: Alcohol; Australia; Evaluation; Policy; Protocol.

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Conflict of interest statement

Authors’ information

Not applicable.

Ethics approval and consent to participate

Ethics approval has been obtained from the Human Research Ethics Committees of Deakin University, The University of Queensland, and James Cook University for all project components.

For applicable study components participants will provide informed consent to participate. This will in the form of verbal consent (patron interviews), implied consent (follow-up patron surveys), and written consent (key informant interviews).

Consent for publication

Not applicable.

Competing interests

This study is funded by an ARC Linkage grant (LP160100067), the Queensland government, Foundation for Alcohol Research and Education, Australian Rechabites Foundation, and Lives Lived Well.

PGM receives funding from Australian Research Council and Australian National Health and Medical Research Council, grants from NSW Government, National Drug Law Enforcement Research Fund, Foundation for Alcohol Research and Education, Cancer Council Victoria, Queensland government and Australian Drug Foundation, travel and related costs from Australasian Drug Strategy Conference. He has acted as a paid expert witness on behalf of a licensed venue and a security firm.

JF receives funding from Australian Research Council and Australian National Health and Medical Research Council, Queensland Government and Foundation for Alcohol Research and Education.

KC receives funding from Australian Research Council and Queensland Government.

HJ, RR, and SC receive funding from the Foundation for Alcohol Research and Education.

KK’s contribution to this paper was from a National Health and Medical Research Council Research Fellowship (1041867). He receives research project funding from the Australian Research Council, the Foundation for Alcohol Research and Education, and the Health Research Council of New Zealand.

TC has received most of her research funding from national and international competitive grant agencies and the Commonwealth Government. She has never received alcoholic beverage industry funding. She has received economy travel class airfare from IOGT-NTO to attend meetings jointly convened by the Swedish Society of Medicine and the IOGT-NTO. Chikritzhs has also received travel funds from Systembolaget, the Swedish retail government-owned alcohol monopoly which operates with a public health and safety mandate.

ML is funded by an NHMRC Career Development Fellowship (1123840) and receives research funding from the Foundation for Alcohol Research and Education, the Australian Research Council and the Victorian Health Promotion Foundation.

All other authors declare that they have no competing interests.

Publisher’s Note

Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.

Figures

Fig. 1
Fig. 1
Timeline of liquor licencing responses in Queensland since 1996
See this image and copyright information in PMC

References

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MeSH terms