BACKGROUND Cirrhosis is the result of chronic liver disease that causes scarring and dysfunction of the liver. The disease is a common concomitant condition resulting from sustained exposure to alcohol. Heavy alcohol use results in brain damage that is generally more severe in cirrhotic compared with noncirrhotic alcoholics. We examined, at the cellular level, gene expression in the frontal cor...

Chronic alcohol abuse affects brain structure and function. We examined subcortical structure volumes in 77 short (6-15 week) and 90 long (multi-year) term abstinent alcoholics, along with 74 controls. We used a 3T Siemens MPRAGE sequence for image acquisition and FSL FIRST software for measuring subcortical volumes. When examining alcoholics without a comorbid stimulant disorder we found reduc...

Aim. The authors present results of research in which they have tried to answer the question of the specificity of parentification process of Adult Children of Alcoholics (ACoA) in comparison to healthy individuals. Method. One hundred twenty people took part in the study: sixty Adult Children of Alcoholics (research group) and sixty adults, who were not raised in families with the problem of a...

In alcoholism research, studies concerning time-locked electrophysiological aspects of response inhibition have concentrated mainly on the P3 component of the event-related potential (ERP). The objective of the present study was to investigate the N2 component of the ERP to elucidate possible brain dysfunction related to the motor response and its inhibition using a Go/NoGo task in alcoholics. ...

OBJECTIVE Chronic alcohol dependence has been associated with disturbed behavior, cerebral atrophy and a low plasma concentration of docosahexaenoic acid (DHA, 22∶6n-3), particularly if liver disease is present. In animal models, excessive alcohol consumption is reported to reduce brain DHA concentration, suggesting disturbed brain DHA metabolism. We hypothesized that brain DHA metabolism also ...

Patients chronically abusing ethanol are more susceptible to the hepatotoxic effects of paracetamol. This could be due to an increased activation of the drug to a toxic metabolite or to a decreased capacity to detoxify the toxic metabolite by conjugation with glutathione (GSH). To test these hypotheses paracetamol 2 g was administered to five chronic alcoholics without clinical evidence of alco...

Personality traits, socio-cultural factors, and dysfunctional family systems are considered to be important in the aetiology and clinical development of alcoholism. Particularly, conflict and issues involving psychological (emotional) dependence have long been associated with alcohol addiction. The present work, part of a more extensive study to validate a new rating scale to measure emotional ...

During a 5-year period, alcoholics having few periods of mental illness interfering with their capacity to work were socially more stable but had more signs of cerebral dysfunction than did alcoholics having more periods of such illness.