Furthermore, due to the low response rate in the open ended questions we can only speculate about those who did not give any reasons. While we could not find any patient characteristics predictive of reporting a reason for not seeking treatment for lifetime AUDs, participants with a severe AUDs diagnosis were less likely to report a reason as compared to persons with a light AUDs diagnosis. It is possible that those patients with severe AUDs did not report a reason because they did not acknowledge the problem or perceived a higher stigmatization. Overall, as reflected in the decreased likelihood to report any reason for not seeking treatment as well as in the discontinuation of observed trends in the reported reasons, this group of patients seems to be a special group and the respective results should be interpreted with caution.
