The literature about the outcome of treatment programs of alcoholism is rather confusing. Therefore a retrospective review was undertaken of the literature. In this article some pitfalls are discussed like: definition of alcoholism, which parameters should be used for a matched control group and followup studies and th influence of the proportion of drop-outs on the results of these studies. Most articles were not able to avoid inaccuracy in one more of these topics. Consequently it is possible that therapists base their choice of treatment on insufficient studies and perhaps wrong conclusions.