THIAMINE AND ALCOHOL FOR BRAIN PATHOLOGY: Super-imposing or different causative factors for brain damage?

THIAMINE AND ALCOHOL FOR BRAIN PATHOLOGY: Super-imposing or different causative factors for brain damage? Curr Drug Abuse Rev. 2018 Apr 02;: Authors: Moretti R, Caruso P, Dal Ben M, Gazzin S, Tiribelli C Abstract Drinking more than the recommended limits is a worldwide emerging problem, difficult to circumscribe, and alcohol related brain damages are an under-recognized health problem. Alcohol-cognitive disruption can be considered as transient and recoverable if the alcohol consumption is limited and occasional; if not, it can progress to the so-called alcohol-related dementia (ARD), or to the Wernicke encephalopathy, or it can even induce the Korsakoff syndrome, an irreversible and long-lasting medical condition. ARD still remains poorly diagnosed and addressed, even if it had recently raised increased research interest. That is a frustrating condition, being ARD a relatively non-progressive, or even partially reversible condition in abstinent ex-drinkers. On the contrary, Wernicke encephalopathy, with its neurological symptoms (ocular coordination imbalance and gait ataxia), is a dramatic medical condition, potentially lethal which can lead towards Korsakoff dementia. The alcohol consumption is a strong reinforcing condition of the thiamine deficit, the main biochemical determinant factor that starts the cascade of the brain irreversible damaging events. Our review focus on the possible common neural pathways of these three condit...
Source: Current Drug Abuse Reviews - Category: Addiction Tags: Curr Drug Abuse Rev Source Type: research