PRESS-NEWS.org - Press Release Distribution
PRESS RELEASES DISTRIBUTION

Recovery of brain volumes with abstinence may vary for different brain regions

2012-10-17
(Press-News.org) Contact: Gabriele Ende, Dr.rer.nat
gabi.ende@zi-mannheim.de
49.621.1703.2971 (Germany)
Central Institute of Mental Health Natalie May Zahr, Ph.D.
nzahr@stanford.edu
650.859.5243
Stanford University
Recovery of brain volumes with abstinence may vary for different brain regions A new study examined what brain volume recovery may take place during the first 14 days of abstinence from alcohol. Findings indicate that recovery of cerebral gray matter volume can begin for alcoholic patients after only a few days of detoxification. Recovery may vary among brain regions. Chronic alcohol abuse can severely damage the nervous system, particularly cognitive functions, cerebral metabolism, and brain morphology. Building upon previous findings that alcoholics can experience brain volume recovery with abstinence, this study found that recovery of cerebral gray matter (GM) can take place within the first two weeks of abstinence, but may vary between brain regions.

Results will be published in the January 2013 issue of Alcoholism: Clinical & Experimental Research and are currently available at Early View.

"Shrinkage of brain matter, and an accompanying increase of cerebrospinal fluid, which acts as a cushion or buffer for the brain, are well-known degradations caused by alcohol abuse," explained Gabriele Ende, professor of medical physics in the Department of Neuroimaging at the Central Institute of Mental Health. 
 "This volume loss has previously been associated with neuropsychological deficits such as memory loss, concentration deficits, and increased impulsivity."

"Several processes likely account for changes in brain tissue volume observed through bouts of drinking and abstinence over the course of alcoholism," added Natalie May Zahr, a research scientist in the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at Stanford University School of Medicine. "One process likely reflects true, irreversible neuronal cell death, while another process likely reflects shrinkage, a mechanism that would allow for volume changes in both negative and positive directions, and could account for brain volume recovery with abstinence."

"Gray matter (GM) and white matter (WM) are the main components of the brain that can be distinguished with magnetic resonance imaging (MRI)," explained Ende. "GM consists of neuronal cell bodies, neuropil, glial cells, and capillaries. WM mostly contains myelinated axon tracts."

"Myelin forms an insulating sheath around axons that increases the speed at which they are able to conduct electrical activity," added Zahr. "Because myelin is composed primarily of fat, it gives white matter its color. Cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) is a clear fluid that surrounds and thereby cushions the brain in the skull. Conventional brain structural MRI produces images of protons, with contributions primarily from water and some from fat. Tissue contrast is possible because of the fundamental differences in water content in the primary tissues of the brain: WM consists of about 70 percent water, GM 80 percent, and CSF 99 percent."

Ende and her colleagues examined 49 alcohol dependent (AD) patients (40 males, 9 females) from an inpatient alcohol-withdrawal treatment program as well as 55 non-AD but age- and gender-matched individuals or controls (42 males, 13 females) recruited from the community. The AD group was scanned within the first 24 hours of detoxification, and again after two weeks of supervised abstinence. Their scans were compared with those of the controls.

"We found evidence for a rather rapid recovery of the brain from alcohol induced volume loss within the initial 14 days of abstinence," said Ende. "Although brain shrinkage as well as a partial recovery with continued abstinence have been elaborately described in previous studies, no previous study has looked at the brain immediately at the onset of alcohol withdrawal and short term recovery. Our study corroborates previous findings of brain volume reduction for certain brain regions."

The findings also showed a volume reduction of the cerebellum at the time of detoxification. "This has rarely been observed in other studies at later time points after alcohol withdrawal," said Ende. "Two weeks after detoxification, this cerebellum reduction was nearly completely ameliorated. This was unknown previously, the amount of initial reduction in the cerebellum and its relatively fast recovery."

Ende added that an individual's ability to recover from AD appears to vary for different brain regions. "The function of the cerebellum is motor coordination and fine tuning of motor skills," she explained. "Even though we did not access the amelioration of motor deficits in our patients quantitatively, it is striking that there is an obvious improvement of motor skills soon after cessation of drinking, which is paralleled by our observation of a rapid volume recovery of the cerebellum. Higher cognitive functions like divided attention, which are processed in specific cortical areas, take a longer time to recover and this seems to be mirrored in the observed slower recovery of brain volumes of these areas."

"Many alcohol treatment programs only deal with the withdrawal stage of abstinence from alcohol, that is, the first three days," noted Zahr. "Based on the current study and others, suggesting that a minimum set of cognitive abilities is necessary to conquer alcohol addiction, clinicians should consider recovery programs that provide support for the recovering addict for a minimum of two weeks."

Ende agreed. "The ultimate goal of alcoholism treatment is the maintenance of abstinence," she said. "To achieve this, the affected person needs to suppress their drinking urges and relearn to value other pleasures. Brain volume loss hinders this difficult process, so a rapid volume gain is advantageous for the establishment of sober relearning."

"This study offers recovering alcoholics a sense of hope," said Zahr. "Hope that even within two weeks of abstinence, the recovering individual should be able to observe improvements in brain functioning that may allow for better insight and thus ability to remain sober. Indeed, a minimal of brain healing may be necessary before the addict is able to achieve the control necessary to maintain continued abstinence."

### Alcoholism: Clinical & Experimental Research (ACER) is the official journal of the Research Society on Alcoholism and the International Society for Biomedical Research on Alcoholism. Co-authors of the ACER paper, "Rapid Partial Regeneration of Brain Volume During the First 14 Days of Abstinence from Alcohol," were: Julia van Eijk and Dr. Traute Demirakca of the Department of Neuroimaging at the University of Heidelberg; and Ulrich Frischknecht, Derik Hermann, and Karl Mann of the Department of Addictive Behavior and Addiction Medicine at the University of Heidelberg. The study was funded by the German Research Foundation (DFG), the Nationales Genomforschungsnetz, and the Bundesministerium für Bildung und Forschung. This release is supported by the Addiction Technology Transfer Center Network at http://www.ATTCnetwork.org.


ELSE PRESS RELEASES FROM THIS DATE:

Alcohol dependence seems to shorten life more than smoking, especially among women

2012-10-17
Contact: Ulrich John, Ph.D. ujohn@uni-greifswald.de 49.3834.867700 (Germany) University Medicine Greifswald Alcoholism: Clinical & Experimental Research Alcohol dependence seems to shorten life more than smoking, especially among women While researchers and clinicians know that the mortality rates among alcohol dependent (AD) individuals are high, most of that knowledge is based on studies of clinical populations. A new study is the first to examine excess mortality and its predictors among AD individuals in the general population throughout a 14-year span, ...

A family history of alcoholism may add to damaging effects of prenatal alcohol exposure

2012-10-17
Contact: Sarah N. Mattson, Ph.D. smattson@sunstroke.sdsu.edu 619.594.7228 San Diego State University Piyadasa W. Kodituwakku, Ph.D. pkodituwakku@salud.unm.edu 505.272.1861 University of New Mexico School of Medicine Alcoholism: Clinical & Experimental Research A family history of alcoholism may add to damaging effects of prenatal alcohol exposure Prenatal exposure to alcohol (PAE) can lead to serious deficiencies, including deficits in spatial working memory (SWM). This is the first study to examine the role of family history of alcoholism (FHP) ...

Tree of life branches out online

2012-10-17
Contact: Simon Levey s.levey@imperial.ac.uk 44-122-344-2837 Imperial College London Tree of life branches out online Exploring the evolutionary tree of life is now as easy as navigating an online map, thanks to a new interactive website called OneZoom, which goes live Tuesday 16 October at www.onezoom.org. The launch is accompanied by an explanatory article in the 'Cool Tools' series of the open access journal PLOS Biology. All living species on Earth descended from a common ancestor that lived in the distant past. Since Darwin, biologists have struggled to draw ...

Researchers discover new blood vessel-generating cell with therapeutic potential

2012-10-17
Researchers at the University of Helsinki believe they have discovered stem cells that play a decisive role in the growth of new blood vessels. If researchers learn to isolate and efficiently produce these stem cells found in blood vessel walls, the cells could offer new opportunities for developing therapeutics to treat diseases, such as cardiovascular disease and cancer. The study reporting the discovery of these stem cells is published in the open access journal PLOS Biology on October 16. The growth of new blood vessels, known as neoangiogenesis, occurs during the ...

Finnish researchers' discover new blood-vessel-generating cell with therapeutic potential

Finnish researchers discover new blood-vessel-generating cell with therapeutic potential
2012-10-17
Researchers at the University of Helsinki, Finland, believe they have discovered stem cells that play a decisive role in new blood vessel growth. If researchers learn to isolate and efficiently produce these stem cells found in blood vessel walls, the cells offer new opportunities in the treatment of cardiovascular diseases, cancer and many other diseases. The study will be published in the PLOS Biology journal on 16 October 2012. The growth of new blood vessels, also known as angiogenesis, is needed in adults when repairing damaged tissue or organs. Unfortunately, malignant ...

New noninvasive test for colorectal cancer shows promise

2012-10-17
ANAHEIM, Calif. — A new noninvasive test for colorectal cancer screening demonstrated high sensitivity for detecting colorectal cancer, in particular precancers that are most likely to develop into cancer, according to data presented at the 11th Annual AACR International Conference on Frontiers in Cancer Prevention Research, held here Oct. 16-19, 2012. "This test measures different kinds of DNA changes, known as methylation and mutation, along with a measure of fecal blood. By combining these measures, we can look for the kinds of biological changes that are most frequently ...

Cholesterol levels improving among US adults

2012-10-17
CHICAGO – An analysis of nationally-representative data indicates that between 1988 and 2010 there has been a trend of declining average levels of total cholesterol, non-high-density lipoprotein cholesterol, and low-density lipoprotein cholesterol for U.S. adults overall, according to a study in the October 17 issue of JAMA. "Epidemiologic studies have demonstrated that high concentrations of low-density lipoprotein cholesterol (LDL-C) and total cholesterol (TC) and low levels of high-density lipoprotein cholesterol (HDL-C) are major risk factors for coronary heart disease ...

Study identifies strategy for improved screening for type of hereditary colorectal cancer

2012-10-17
CHICAGO – In a comparison of strategies to identify individuals with Lynch syndrome, the most common form of hereditary colorectal cancer (CRC), caused by mutations in certain genes (DNA mismatch repair [MMR] genes), universal tumor MMR testing among certain CRC patients had a greater sensitivity for the identification of Lynch syndrome compared with multiple alternative strategies, although the diagnostic improvement was modest, according to a study in the October 17 issue of JAMA. Colorectal cancer is the third most common cancer worldwide and the second leading cause ...

Lower chloride use in intravenous fluids for critically ill patients may lower risk of kidney injury

2012-10-17
CHICAGO – In a pilot study assessing the effect of different levels of chloride in intravenous fluids administered to critically ill patients in an intensive care unit, restricting the amount of chloride administration was associated with a significant decrease in the incidence of acute kidney injury and the use of renal replacement therapy, according to a study in the October 17 issue of JAMA. "The administration of intravenous chloride is ubiquitous in critical care medicine," according to background in the article. Many of the fluids used for hydration and resuscitation ...

No benefit from high-dose multivitamins seen for HIV patients receiving antiretroviral therapy

2012-10-17
Boston, MA – A new study by Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH) researchers suggests that, for HIV patients receiving highly active antiretroviral therapy (HAART) to treat HIV, there is no benefit from high- vs. standard-dose micronutrient supplementation—and that, in fact, high-dose supplements may cause harm. The study is the first large randomized trial to look at how high-dose multivitamin supplementation affects clinical outcomes among people on HAART. The study appears in the October 17, 2012 issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA). Previous ...

LAST 30 PRESS RELEASES:

Being consistently physically active in adulthood linked to 30–40% lower risk of death

Nerve pain drug gabapentin linked to increased dementia, cognitive impairment risks

Children’s social care involvement common to nearly third of UK mums who died during perinatal period

‘Support, not judgement’: Study explores links between children’s social care involvement and maternal deaths

Ethnic minority and poorer children more likely to die in intensive care

Major progress in fertility preservation after treatment for cancer of the lymphatic system

Fewer complications after additional ultrasound in pregnant women who feel less fetal movement

Environmental impact of common pesticides seriously underestimated

The Milky Way could be teeming with more satellite galaxies than previously thought

New study reveals surprising reproductive secrets of a cricket-hunting parasitoid fly

Media Tip Sheet: Symposia at ESA2025

NSF CAREER Award will power UVA engineer’s research to improve drug purification

Tiny parasitoid flies show how early-life competition shapes adult success

New coating for glass promises energy-saving windows

Green spaces boost children’s cognitive skills and strengthen family well-being

Ancient trees dying faster than expected in Eastern Oregon

Study findings help hone precision of proven CVD risk tool

Most patients with advanced melanoma who received pre-surgical immunotherapy remain alive and disease free four years later

Introducing BioEmu: A generative AI Model that enables high-speed and accurate prediction of protein structural ensembles

Replacing mutated microglia with healthy microglia halts progression of genetic neurological disease in mice and humans

New research shows how tropical plants manage rival insect tenants by giving them separate ‘flats’

Condo-style living helps keep the peace inside these ant plants

Climate change action could dramatically limit rising UK heatwave deaths

Annual heat-related deaths projected to increase significantly due to climate and population change

Researchers discover new way cells protect themselves from damage

Rivers choose their path based on erosion — a discovery that could transform flood planning and restoration

New discovery reveals dopamine operates with surgical precision, not as a broad signal

New AI tool gives a helping hand to x ray diagnosis

New Leicester study reveals hidden heart risks in women with Type 2 Diabetes

Over 400 different types of nerve cell have been grown – far more than ever before

[Press-News.org] Recovery of brain volumes with abstinence may vary for different brain regions