Carbohydrate-deficient transferrin (CDT) was measured in 408 blood specimens, randomly selected from drivers (N = 1,260) apprehended and submitted to blood alcohol concentration (BAC) determination. The first step of the study was to observe whether a BAC-based pre-evaluation was relevant for deciding to test drivers for chronic alcohol abuse. For this purpose, the diagnosis of chronic alcohol abuse was verified by CDT determination, with a high positive cut-off selected at 3% for high specificity. The results showed a significant increase in the part of chronic alcohol abusers with respect to increasing BAC: a few alcohol abusers were present in the BAC category below 0.5 g/L, and their frequency increased to 47% when BAC was between 3 and 3.5 g/L and 67% when BAC was above 3.5 g/L. Secondly, the usefulness of the biomarker CDT in the traffic safety context was investigated by observing whether drivers with abnormally increased CDT value had also higher BAC. The average BAC was 1.32 g/L in drivers with CDT below 1%, and increased to 2.28 g/L in drivers with CDT above 3%. Statistical analysis showed evidence of a monotonic increasing link between BAC and CDT (p < 0.0001). The results confirm the relevance of BAC-based pre-evaluation before testing chronic alcohol abuse among drivers, and demonstrate that CDT is a suitable biomarker in the context of traffic safety, as drivers with increased CDT had significantly higher BAC. (Author/publisher)
Abstract