SMMGP Clinical Update

This letter to the editor raises the issue of baclofen and the French experience with ‘its potentially miraculous effects’ on alcohol dependence. Much of this stems from a French cardiologist, Olivier Ameisen, who suffered from alcohol dependence and tested baclofen on himself with great success. There was a study in the Lancet in 2007 which showed some promising results but there has been little else in the way of evidence. There has, however, been considerable popular media interest and apparently an ‘overwhelming number of patients now beg their physicians’ for treatment with high dose baclofen. Sales of baclofen in France have risen 20% between 2008 and 2010.