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Alcohol and Alcoholism Advance Access published online on June 27, 2008
Alcohol and Alcoholism, doi:10.1093/alcalc/agn056
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© The Author 2008. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the Medical Council on Alcohol. All rights reserved

Assessment of GABAA benzodiazepine receptor (GBzR) sensitivity in patients with alcohol dependence

Claire Taylor, Jon Nash, Ann Rich, Anne Lingford-Hughes, David Nutt and John Potokar*

Psychopharmacology Unit, Dorothy Hodgkin Building, Whitson Street, Bristol BS1 3NY, UK

* Corresponding author: Psychopharmacology Unit, Dorothy Hodgkin Building, Whitson Street, Bristol BS1 3NY, UK. Tel: +44-117-33-13143; Fax: +44-117-33-13180; E-mail: John.Potokar{at}bristol.ac.uk

Received 20 February 2008; first review notified 17 April 2008; in revised form 28 May 2008; accepted 5 June 2008


  Abstract

Aim: The aim of this study was to measure GABAA benzodiazepine receptor (GBzR) sensitivity in alcohol-dependent patients and compare with matched non-dependent drinkers. Methods: Nine abstinent alcohol-dependent male patients, age matched with nine male non-dependent social drinkers, received an intravenous infusion of midazolam. Objective (saccadic eye movement slowing) and subjective (visual analogue scales) measurements were recorded at 15-min intervals for 2 h. Results: There were no differences in objective or subjective measures. Conclusions: Our hypothesis that patients with alcohol dependence would have less slowing of their eye movements in response to this challenge, reflecting reduced GBzR sensitivity, was not confirmed. The reasons for this could mean that GBzR function returns to normal with abstinence, or that this paradigm is unable to measure the subtle subtype-specific changes in GBzR sensitivity that occur following dependent alcohol use.


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