At first glance, the findings from the COGA EA and Indiana Biobank liver disease cohort appear to contradict each other. However, post-hoc exploratory analyses showed that most Indiana Biobank participants in both cohorts had liver diseases (Table 4). Of the remitted individuals who had liver diseases, 88.65% and 71.79% of remission in Indiana Biobank liver diseases cohort and SUD occurred subsequent to their liver disease diagnoses (data not shown), suggesting that they were “sick quitters” (Kerr and Ye, 2010). In contrast, ≤8% of COGA participants reported the presence of liver diseases. Additionally, Indiana Biobank participants were older than COGA participants (mean ages at remission or last encounter >54 versus <35 years). Increased age might provide more opportunity to reduce one’s problematic drinking (Leggat et al., 2022, Britton et al., 2015, Knott et al., 2018, Molander et al., 2010), but in a clinical sample, increased age might also reflect a longer history of problematic consumption and an elevated risk of associated medical problems. This may also explain the non-significant findings in Indiana Biobank SUD cohort - they were about 5 years
