A growing number of studies have implicated the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis in acute and chronic alcoholization and in ethanol withdrawal. In order to study the ethanol/HPA axis interaction during alcohol withdrawal, we performed experiments using adrenalectomized (ADX) male rats alcoholized by a chronic pulmonary alcoholization procedure. Eight hours after the 3 weeks of the alcoholization procedure, the rats were evaluated for a tremor activity. In order to reduce the great variability of the withdrawal tremors, we estimated the supersensitivity of the withdrawn rats to the tremorogenic compound harmine. We also studied the effect of a hydrocortisone treatment given in the drinking bottle during the alcoholization procedure on the harmine-induced tremors of ADX and sham rats. Alcohol withdrawal resulted in increased tremor response to 10 mg/kg harmine, and a protective effect of adrenalectomy on this effect was observed. Hydrocortisone administration to ADX or sham rats did not affect the tremor profile of the alcohol withdrawn rats.
Chronic alcoholization by ethyl-alcohol inhalation was used to study the properties of a spin-trapping agent on different alcohol manifestations in rat. The spin-trapping agent, i.e. N-tert-butyl-alpha-phenylnitrone (PBN), was given at the dose of 32 mg/kg twice a day during the whole alcoholization procedure. The blood alcohol level, the hypermotility which accompanied the ethanol withdrawal, the behavioral dependence as estimated by a free-choice program and the hypervascularization which is developed after a chronic pulmonary alcoholization were quantified. The rats treated with PBN differ from the control rats only by their higher blood alcohol level at the end of the chronic alcoholization while the other quantified alcohol-induced manifestations remained unchanged.
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