The brain encourages the repetition of this behavior. People with alcohol-use disorder experience pleasure and a sense of reward when they drink, and learn to associate alcohol with various people and situations. “Further fMRI brain studies could explore chemical aversion therapy’s value with opioid dependence and other substance abuse.” “This implicates craving reduction as a mechanism of how chemical aversion therapy is changing patients’ drinking behavior,” said Hunter Hoffman, a radiology research scientist for UW Medicine and investigator in mechanical engineering at the University of Washington’s Human Photonics Lab. Hunter Hoffman is a radiology research scientist.įMRI scans taken before and during 10 days of Schick’s in-house treatment showed significant changes in brain activity among the 13 study subjects.
SCHICK SHADEL HOSPITAL MANUAL
“Craving was recently added as one of the defining criteria for diagnosing alcohol use disorder in the DSM-5,” healthcare providers’ authoritative manual for diagnosing mental conditions. “Among organizations that treat alcohol abuse, there is growing awareness of the importance of craving,” said Ralph Elkins, Schick Shadel’s director of research. The small-scale study, published in Frontiers in Behavioral Neuroscience, was the first to employ functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to examine how chemical aversion therapy affects brain activity related to craving. Chemical aversion therapy shows promise as a way to curb alcohol abuse among heavy drinkers, according to findings published by Schick Shadel Hospital and UW Medicine researchers in Seattle.
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