Nonalcoholic Participants Research Articles

Hepatic artery disorders associated with alcoholism.

We aimed to characterize the relationship between severe chronic alcoholism and hepatic arterial wall disorders in humans. We obtained hepatic arteries from 165 patients undergoing liver transplantation who were placed into two etiological groups: an Alcoholism group and a Non-alcoholism group. We compared the age, sex, lipid profile, and histologic characteristics of the hepatic arteries (normal, reduction in luminal diameter of ≤10%, or atherosclerosis) of the participants in the two groups using multifactor analyses. The Alcoholism group comprised 58 men and 40 women and the Non-alcoholism group comprised 63 men and 4 women. The mean ages of the groups were 52.5 ± 9.6 years and 44.2 ± 13.8 years, respectively. There were no circulating lipid abnormalities in any of the participants. In women, arterial disorders were found at a younger age than in men. Hepatic arterial disorders were more frequent in the non-alcoholic participants, and women with alcoholism showed less arterial narrowing. The heavy consumption of alcoholic beverages is associated with a lower incidence of atherosclerosis of the hepatic artery in humans.

Risk factors appraisal for Hypertension among rural community of Western Maharashtra: A field-based study

Background: Hypertension is a leading risk factor for cardiovascular diseases. WHO has drawn attention to the fact that, Hypertension and related cardiovascular diseases are our modern epidemic. This contributes to high morbidity, cardiovascular disabilities and increasing mortality in the population. Such trends put an excessive burden on the quantum and quality of health care and necessitate more focus on more costly secondary and tertiary health care. Methods: A field based cross sectional descriptive study was conducted among rural population above 40 years. A pretested and structured questionnaire was used to record requisite information. A JNC VII criterion was used for blood pressure measurements. Data was analyzed with univariate and multivariate analysis. Results: Overall prevalence of hypertension among study participants observed was 5.92% (213 cases). Study participants having ‘Sedentary’ type of physical activity showed maximum number of cases (117 cases) than ‘Moderate’ or ‘Heavy’ physical activity group. Prevalence of hypertension was seen higher among upper class social-economic status population. Study participants consuming alcohol with varied frequency showed 158 cases out of total 213 cases while non-alcoholic participants (1995), had 55 cases of hypertension. Conclusions: The risk of hypertension increases with Advancing age positive family history and in male gender. Use of tobacco, alcohol consumption and resorting to non-vegetarian diet are the other contributory factors and the risk is more in the widowed persons as well as in those who are obese. Screening programmes with continuing health education for timely diagnosis and further treatment are to be stressed at policy formation.

Saliva Sampling of Alcoholic Participants using Three Saliva Collection Methods

The potential of using saliva as a diagnostic fluid is well documented. The aim of this study was to assess the quality and quantity of saliva DNA of alcoholic and non-alcoholic participants using three saliva collection methods; DNA-SalTM (Oasis Diagnostics, USA), Oragene-DNA (DNA Genotek Inc, Ontario, Canada) and whole saliva collection method. Saliva DNA of non-alcoholic (n=30) and alcoholic participants (n=10) age between 25 and 35 years was assessed qualitatively and quantitatively using spectrophotometry. Saliva DNA quantity was the highest for all participants when using the DNA-Sal TM saliva collection kit (p<0.05). The use of a mechanical scraper provided only in the DNA-Sal TM kit may have contributed to the highest DNA yield for all participants. The quantity of saliva DNA when assessed using spectrophotometer was found to be significantly lower (p<0.05) for the alcoholic (16±3.57 ng/μL) than non-alcoholic participants (19.92±6.18 ng/μL). To determine the integrity of the DNA samples, PCR amplification of the Alcohol Dehydrogenase gene, ADH1B was carried out and the PCR was found to be successful. For all participants, the DNA quality of the saliva collected using the three saliva collection methods was found to be in the acceptable range considered as pure DNA. The DNA quality and quantity of saliva collected from the three saliva collection methods were considered suitable for research purposes.

Alcoholism detection by medical robots based on Hu moment invariants and predator–prey adaptive-inertia chaotic particle swarm optimization

This work is aimed to develop the key algorithms used in medical robots, which can detect alcohol use disorder from structural magnetic resonance imaging of brains. We enrolled 30 alcoholic participants and 30 nonalcoholic participants. In the algorithm stage, we suggested to use Hu moment invariant to extract global features, and use single-hidden layer neural-network as the classifier. Afterwards, we proposed a novel predator–prey adaptive-inertia chaotic particle swarm optimization algorithm to train the classifier. The ten-fold stratified cross validation showed that our method achieves a sensitivity of 90.67 ± 3.16%, a specificity of 91.33 ± 3.06%, and an accuracy of 91.00 ± 1.41%. Our results are better than genetic algorithm, firefly algorithm, and particle swarm optimization. This proposes algorithm is effective in alcoholism detection. It can be installed on medical robots.

Associations Between Personality and Drinking Motives Among Abstinent Adult Alcoholic Men and Women

Men and women differ in personality characteristics and may be motivated to use alcohol for different reasons. The goals of the present study were to characterize personality and drinking motives by gender and alcoholism status in adults, and to determine how alcoholism history and gender are related to the associations between personality traits and drinking motivation. Personality characteristics were assessed with the Eysenck Personality Questionnaire, which includes Extraversion, Neuroticism, Psychoticism and Lie (Social Conforming) scales. To evaluate drinking motivation, we asked abstinent long-term alcoholic men and women, and demographically similar nonalcoholic participants to complete the Drinking Motives Questionnaire, which includes Conformity, Coping, Social and Enhancement scales. Patterns of personality scale scores and drinking motives differed by alcoholism status, with alcoholics showing higher psychopathology and stronger motives for drinking compared with controls. Divergent gender-specific relationships between personality and drinking motives also were identified, which differed for alcoholics and controls. Alcoholic and control men and women differed with respect to the associations between personality traits and motives for drinking. A better understanding of how different personality traits affect drinking motivations for alcoholic men and women can inform individualized relapse prevention strategies. Men and women differed in their personality traits and their motivations for drinking, and these relationships differed for abstinent alcoholic and control groups. Additionally, alcoholics scored higher on Neuroticism and Psychoticism personality traits, and had lower Enhancement and Social Conformity drinking motives than nonalcoholic controls.

Impulsivity and current alcohol use in adolescents

IntroductionMany studies have focused on the strong link between impulsivity and addictive behaviors, such as alcohol use disorders.ObjectiveOur study aimed to investigate the links between alcohol use and impulsivity in a sample of Tunisian pupils.MethodsThis was a cross-sectional study conducted in May and June 2016. It enrolled 317 pupils from four colleges and schools in Sfax (Tunisia). The participants were asked to answer a self-administered questionnaire, after their consent. Alcohol use disorders identification test (AUDIT) was used to evaluate alcohol dependence. The Barratt Impulsiveness Scale (BIS), in its 11th version, was used to assess impulsivity trait. Its three second-order factors were attentional impulsiveness, motor impulsiveness, and non-planning impulsiveness.ResultsThe mean age was 16 years with a sex-ratio of 1.07. The school children reported having drunk alcohol at least once in 18.9% of cases and 41.66% of them still consume. According to AUDIT, 1.6% of alcohol users presented an alcohol misuse and 21.6% presented dependence. According to BIS, impulsivity prevalence (IP) in the whole sample was 27.8% while it was 40% among the alcoholic participants versus 24.9% in non-alcoholic participants. The average BIS score was more important in the alcoholic participants (69.25 versus 65.53; P = 0.011). Alcohol consumption was correlated to attentional impulsiveness (P = 0.01) and motor impulsiveness (P = 0.008). Alcohol dependence was correlated to motor impulsiveness (P = 0.018).ConclusionThese results show the importance of clinically evaluating and intervening on impulsive personality traits to better prevent addictive behavior such as alcoholism among adolescents.Disclosure of interestThe authors have not supplied their declaration of competing interest.

Associations Between Cerebellar Subregional Morphometry and Alcoholism History in Men and Women.

Alcoholism has been linked to deficits in cognitive, behavioral, and emotional functions, and the cerebellum is important for optimal functioning of these abilities. However, little is known about how individual differences such as gender and drinking history might influence regional cerebellar abnormalities. Volumetric analyses of the cerebellum and its subregions were performed in relation to the interaction of gender and measures of drinking history. Structural magnetic resonance imaging scans of 44 alcoholic individuals (23 men) and 39 nonalcoholic controls (18 men) were obtained. In addition to measuring total cerebellar gray and white matter volumes, we measured 64 individual cerebellar parcellation units, as well as functionally defined a priori regions of interest that have been shown to correspond to functions impaired in alcoholism. Total cerebellar white matter volume was smaller in alcoholic relative to nonalcoholic participants. Moreover, volumes of parcellation units varied with drinking history, showing negative associations between years of heavy drinking and the anterior lobe, the vestibulocerebellar lobe, and the spinocerebellar subdivision. The negative association between anterior volume and years of heavy drinking was driven primarily by alcoholic men. Additionally, we observed larger white and gray matter volumes for alcoholic women than for alcoholic men. The identification of drinking-related abnormalities in cerebellar subregions lays a foundation that can be utilized to inform how cerebro-cerebellar networks are perturbed in this pathological condition. These results also provide estimates of how gender and individual differences in drinking history can predict cerebellar volumes.

Measures of skin conductance and heart rate in alcoholic men and women during memory performance.

We examined abnormalities in physiological responses to emotional stimuli associated with long-term chronic alcoholism. Skin conductance responses (SCR) and heart rate (HR) responses were measured in 32 abstinent alcoholic (ALC) and 30 healthy nonalcoholic (NC) men and women undergoing an emotional memory task in an MRI scanner. The task required participants to remember the identity of two emotionally-valenced faces presented at the onset of each trial during functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) scanning. After viewing the faces, participants saw a distractor image (an alcoholic beverage, nonalcoholic beverage, or scrambled image) followed by a single probe face. The task was to decide whether the probe face matched one of the two encoded faces. Skin conductance measurements (before and after the encoded faces, distractor, and probe) were obtained from electrodes on the index and middle fingers on the left hand. HR measurements (beats per minute before and after the encoded faces, distractor, and probe) were obtained by a pulse oximeter placed on the little finger on the left hand. We expected that, relative to NC participants, the ALC participants would show reduced SCR and HR responses to the face stimuli, and that we would identify greater reactivity to the alcoholic beverage stimuli than to the distractor stimuli unrelated to alcohol. While the beverage type did not differentiate the groups, the ALC group did have reduced skin conductance and HR responses to elements of the task, as compared to the NC group.

Attachment relationships among alcohol dependent persons

IntroductionThis article presents the results of a study on alcohol dependent patients attachment style and its various dimensions. MethodThere were 94 alcoholic and 94 non-alcoholic participants (both 53 women and 41 men). Plopa's Questionnaire of Attachment Styles (KSP) and Collins and Read's Adult Attachment Scale (AAS) were used.The variable of having a dependent parent was also taken into consideration. ResultsThe study has shown that people with alcohol dependence significantly differ from non-alcoholics in terms of attachment style and its dimensions. They also receive significantly lower scores on secure attachment style and higher scores on insecure attachment style – anxious-ambivalent and avoidant style, and higher scores on attachment dimensions – anxiety and avoidance. There were no differences in attachment styles and their dimensions for patients with alcohol dependent and non-dependent parents. ConclusionsAlcohol dependent persons rarely present secure connection to others and more often manifest mistrust in interpersonal relationships and avoid closeness and intimacy.

Personality of Alcohol Addict According to the Theory of Transactional Analysis

Objectiveof the research was to examine the differences in ego states profile, life positions and drivers between alcohol addicts and non-alcoholic participants. 72 respondents took part in the research, 36 of whom were alcohol addict and 36 of whom were the people who do not consume alcohol nor suffer from serious somatic or psychiatric disease. The obtained results point to the existence of statistically significant differences between the alcohol addict group and control group in the presence of drivers: Please others, Be perfect and Try hard. The differences between groups in life positions and ego states profile are not statistically significant.

The contribution of executive functions deficits to impaired episodic memory in individuals with alcoholism

Individuals with alcoholism commonly exhibit impaired performance on episodic memory tasks. However, the contribution of their impaired executive functioning to poor episodic memory remains to be clarified. Thirty-six recently detoxified and sober asymptomatic alcoholic men and 36 matched non-alcoholic participants were tested for processing speed, prepotent response inhibition, mental flexibility, coordination of dual-task and a verbal episodic memory task. Compared with non-alcoholic individuals, the alcoholic patients showed impaired executive functions combined with below normal performance on both free and delayed recall. In contrast, processing speed, cued recall and recognition were preserved. Regression analyses revealed that 47% of alcoholics' episodic memory's free recall performance was predicted by mental flexibility and that 49% of their delayed recall performance was predicted by mental flexibility, manipulation of dual-task and prepotent response inhibition. Regarding participants' executive predictors of episodic memory performance, the slopes of β coefficients were significantly different between the two groups, with alcoholics requiring more their executive system than non-alcoholics. Once detoxified, alcoholic patients showed episodic memory deficits mainly characterized by impaired effortful (executive) processes. Compared with controls, patients used effortful learning strategies, which are nonetheless less efficient.

Reduced Cortical Thickness in Abstinent Alcoholics and Association with Alcoholic Behavior

Chronic misuse of alcohol results in widespread damage to the brain. Prior morphometric studies have examined cortical atrophy in individuals with alcoholism; however, no previous studies have examined alcohol-associated atrophy using cortical thickness measurements to obtain regional mapping of tissue loss across the full cortical surface. We compared cortical thickness measures from 31 abstinent individuals with a history of prior alcohol abuse to 34 healthy nonalcoholic control participants (total sample size = 65). Cortical surface models were created from high-resolution T1-weighted images, and cortical thickness was then estimated as the distance between the gray matter/white matter boundary and the outer cortical surface. Abstinent alcoholics showed reduced whole-brain thickness as compared to nonalcoholic participants. Decreases in thickness were found bilaterally in (i) superior frontal, (ii) precentral, (iii) postcentral, (iv) middle frontal, (v) middle/superior temporal, (vi) middle temporal, and (vii) lateral occipital cortical regions. Decreased cortical thickness in the alcoholic group was associated with severity of alcohol abuse. These findings demonstrate widespread reduction in cortical thickness as a consequence of chronic alcoholism, with most severe reductions in frontal and temporal brain regions.

Selective attentional processing and the right hemisphere: Effects of aging and alcoholism.

Thirty-seven nonalcoholic individuals (22 women, 15 men), ages 26-76, and 36 abstinent alcoholic individuals (11 women, 25 men), ages 31-74, participated in a cued-detection task that assessed right hemisphere (RH) functioning associated with aging and alcoholism. Young controls were less reliant on cues following RH activation, which is consistent with the view that the RH has an advantage because it has the ability to attend to a broader spatial array than does the left hemisphere (LH). This RH advantage was not obtained in older controls or alcoholic participants. The pattern of results for the older nonalcoholic participants indicated that they neither benefited from valid cues following LH activation nor exhibited enhanced processing on invalid cue trials following RH activation. The results for the alcoholic participants were consistent with RH functional decline, but did not support the view that alcoholism and aging have synergistic effects.

Selective attentional processing and the right hemisphere: Effects of aging and alcoholism.

Thirty-seven nonalcoholic individuals (22 women, 15 men), ages 26-76, and 36 abstinent alcoholic individuals (11 women, 25 men), ages 31-74, participated in a cued-detection task that assessed right hemisphere (RH) functioning associated with aging and alcoholism. Young controls were less reliant on cues following RH activation, which is consistent with the view that the RH has an advantage because it has the ability to attend to a broader spatial array than does the left hemisphere (LH). This RH advantage was not obtained in older controls or alcoholic participants. The pattern of results for the older nonalcoholic participants indicated that they neither benefited from valid cues following LH activation nor exhibited enhanced processing on invalid cue trials following RH activation. The results for the alcoholic participants were consistent with RH functional decline, but did not support the view that alcoholism and aging have synergistic effects.

Self-Efficacy, Outcome Expectations, and Fantasies as Predictors of Alcoholics' Posttreatment Drinking

The usefulness of distinguishing between alcoholic patients' expectations and their fantasies about treatment outcome was examined. Results at 6 and 12 months follow-up did not support the results of research with nonalcoholic participants which related better outcomes to a combination of positive expectations and negative fantasies about future drink-related situations. Higher self-efficacy expectancy at intake, however, was associated with better clinical outcome. Findings supported Bandura's (1986) contention that outcome expectations add little information on prediction beyond that explained by self-efficacy expectancy. The clinical implications of these results are discussed.