title: Abnormal white matter integrity in long-term abstinent alcohol dependent patients.
abstract: A number of diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) studies have reported substantial white matter (WM) abnormalities in alcohol-dependent patients. These studies were usually performed in recovering alcohol-dependent patients who had been abstinent for days to several weeks. The current study was designed to examine WM microstructure and decision-making in a sample of long-term abstinent alcohol-dependent patients. The study included 12 subjects with alcohol dependence who had been abstinent for at least 6 months before testing and scanning and 13 healthy control subjects. The Iowa Gambling Task (IGT) was used to measure decision-making. We found that the long-term abstinent alcohol-dependent group had significantly higher radial and axial diffusivity (RD and AD, respectively) values in frontal, temporal and parietal WM than was found in the healthy control group despite showing no difference in fractional anisotropy (FA) values in comparison to controls. In conclusion, we found widespread WM changes in long-term abstinent alcohol-dependent patients compared with healthy controls. Our findings suggested that AD and RD should be included in analyses of DTI data in addition to the more commonly studied FA. In the current study, FA values of the detoxified alcoholics had recovered and were comparable to those of the controls, whereas significant changes in AD and RD were still observed in some clusters in the frontal, parietal and temporal lobes of detoxified alcoholics even after 27.8 months.
authors.affiliation: Katip Celebi University Ataturk Training And Research Hospital, Department Of Psychiatry, Izmir, Turkey. Electronic address: zorlunabi@hotmail.com.
authors.forename: Nabi
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Zorlu
authors.affiliation: Katip Celebi University Ataturk Training And Research Hospital, Department Of Psychiatry, Izmir, Turkey.
authors.forename: Tugba
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Karavul Ucman
authors.affiliation: Katip Celebi University Ataturk Training And Research Hospital, Department Of Radiodiagnostics, Izmir, Turkey.
authors.forename: Fazil
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Gelal
authors.affiliation: Katip Celebi University Ataturk Training And Research Hospital, Department Of Psychiatry, Izmir, Turkey.
authors.forename: Cigdem
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Colak Kalayci
authors.affiliation: Katip Celebi University Ataturk Training And Research Hospital, Department Of Psychiatry, Izmir, Turkey.
authors.forename: Serap
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Polat
authors.affiliation: Katip Celebi University Ataturk Training And Research Hospital, Department Of Psychiatry, Izmir, Turkey.
authors.forename: Aybala
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Saricicek
authors.affiliation: Bozyaka Training And Research Hospital Department Of Psychiatry, Izmir, Turkey.
authors.forename: Pelin
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Kurtgöz Zorlu
authors.affiliation: Katip Celebi University Ataturk Training And Research Hospital, Department Of Psychiatry, Izmir, Turkey.
authors.forename: Seref
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Gulseren
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D064829:Alcohol Abstinence; D000437:Alcoholism / Q000473:pathology*; D016880:Anisotropy; D002540:Cerebral Cortex / Q000473:pathology*; D003657:Decision Making; D056324:Diffusion Tensor Imaging; D005260:Female; D005625:Frontal Lobe / Q000473:pathology; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D010296:Parietal Lobe / Q000473:pathology; D013702:Temporal Lobe / Q000473:pathology; D013997:Time Factors; D066127:White Matter / Q000473:pathology*
keywords: Alcohol dependence; Decision-making; Diffusion tensor imaging; Iowa Gambling Task; Tract Based Spatial Statistics