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In times of information overload, researchers have found ways to synthesise a large amount of data from numerous studies bearing on the effectiveness of treatment for alcohol problems. Two of these ways are discussed: formal meta‐analysis and the box‐score ‘mesa grande’. It is concluded that meta‐analysis cannot answer questions regarding which treatments give the best results in the alcohol field. The mesa grande has certain limitations, which are described, but is useful for the formation of treatment policies when a clear summary of the research evidence on treatment effectiveness is needed. By contrast, large multi‐centre randomised controlled trials with enough statistical power to detect small effects of treatment should normally be preferred when a decision has to be made as to which of two or more specified treatments should be implemented in practice. Unfortunately, two multi‐centre trials, one in the USA and one in the UK, have given rise to the ‘dodo bird’ verdict of equivalent effectiveness of four treatment modalities. The findings of the UK Alcohol Treatment Trial cannot be used to advise treatment providers and practitioners which one of two treatments, MET or SBNT, should be preferred in practice. In the absence of relevant research findings, four possible ways of making this decision are outlined, including the suggestion that MET should serve as the first step in a stepped‐care model of treatment provision.

Excessive alcohol consumption is a major cause of health and social problems in the UK. Research has shown that alcohol‐related problems are responsive to early identification and brief intervention in primary health care. However, primary health care professionals have generally been reluctant to implement alcohol screening and brief intervention into routine practice. Addressing this issue has been the latest focus of an ongoing World Health Organization (WHO) Collaborative Project. The present study (Phase IV) is concerned with the implementation of screening and brief intervention materials and procedures for widespread and routine use in primary health care.

Harm minimisation still gets a rough ride in some circles. In the US, harm minimisation is still seen as a failure among many professionals ‐ where abstinence‐based Alcoholic and Narcotics Anonymous still hold the sway in public and political opinion. But what about the UK? Surely we have a more balanced view and put clients' needs before professional dogma. Not so says Brenda Coldwell. She reveals why some professionals are fighting to get controlled drinking back on the agenda and advocating something the drug treatment field takes for granted ‐ she makes the case for client‐centred alcohol treatment.

The purpose of this paper is to present an update on the Ealing Intensive Therapeutic and Short Breaks Service (ITSBS).

The challenges the service has faced are reviewed, including the service’s response to those challenges. Also provided is a more detailed analysis of the outcomes of the service.

The ITSBS continues to succeed in supporting young people with intellectual disabilities and challenging behaviour to stay at home with their families.

Despite considerable challenges and adaptations to the model, the ITSBS is still achieving successful outcomes for vulnerable young people and is considered nationally to be a best-practice model. Few prior articles have provided an account of how innovative service models are maintained and evolve over time.

The application of category theory to interoperability to increase understanding of the problems and to facilitate the development of practical tools for their solution.

Category theory is naturally suited to handling interoperability. The use of first order predicate logic in many information systems may be justified through its completeness. However, the work of Gödel shows that such systems are undecidable if they rely on formal systems of number and/or sets. For interoperability dyadic higher order logic is required, which is neither complete nor decidable if based on sets. However, pure category theory is still axiomatic so is also neither complete nor decidable. Applied category theory based on cartesian closed categories for process is natural and is both complete and decidable. Gödel's theorems therefore do not apply.

The paper finds that composed adjunctions appear particularly well‐suited for modelling interoperability, with composition of distinct functors for mapping across a number of levels and of endofunctors for business process interoperability. The monad/comonad category provides a powerful abstraction of the business process. The development of a tool based on categorial principles written in Haskell may be a way forward but only as an initial set model approach.

This paper applies categorial constructions which permit a natural formal approach to interoperability.