Early Identification of Alcohol Use Disorder Patients at Risk of Developing Korsakoff’s Syndrome

Abstract

Background: The aim of the present study was to determine whether the Brief Evaluation of Alcohol-Related Neuropsychological Impairments (BEARNI), a screening tool developed to identify neuropsychological deficits in Alcohol Use Disorder (AUD) patients, can also be used as a relevant tool for the early identification of AUD patients at risk of developing Korsakoff's syndrome (KS). Methods: Eighteen KS patients, 47 AUD patients and 27 healthy controls underwent BEARNI (including five subtests targeting episodic memory, working memory, executive function, visuospatial abilities and ataxia) and a comprehensive neuropsychological examination. Results: Performance of AUD and KS patients on BEARNI subtests is in accordance with the results on the standardized neuropsychological assessment. On BEARNI, ataxia and working memory deficits observed in AUD were as severe as those exhibited by KS patients, whereas for visuospatial abilities, a graded effect of performance was found. On the opposite, the subtests involving long-term memory abilities (episodic memory and fluency) were impaired in KS patients only. AUD patients with a score lower than 1.5 points (/6) on the episodic memory subtest of BEARNI could be considered at risk of developing KS and exhibited the lowest episodic memory performance on the neuropsychological battery. Conclusions: These findings suggest that BEARNI is a relevant tool to detect severe memory impairments, thus making early identification of AUD patients at high risk of developing KS possible.

Structural brain substrates of the deficits observed on the BEARNI test in alcohol use disorder and Korsakoff's syndrome

“…In the previous study using BEARNI and conducted in AUD and KS (Ritz et al, 2021), comparisons between KS, AUD patients and HC revealed that for all BEARNI subtests, KS patients had lower performance than HC. KS patients also performed lower than AUD patients for the episodic memory, executive, and visuospatial subtests.…”

“…All participants were included in a previous study (Ritz et al, 2021): 18 KS patients, 47 AUD patients, and 27 healthy controls (HC) (Table 1). KS patients were diagnosed with reference to the clinical DSM‐IV criteria of “amnesia due to substance abuse” and to the DSM‐5 criteria of “major neurocognitive disorders, confabulatory type, persistent”.…”

“…Brief Evaluation of Alcohol‐Related Neuropsychological Impairments (BEARNI) task is a validated screening tool especially designed to detect alcohol‐related neuropsychological impairments (Pelletier et al, 2018; Ritz, Lannuzel, et al, 2015). It was found to be a reliable predictor of performance on an extensive neuropsychological battery (Ritz, Lannuzel, et al, 2015) and relevant in the cognitive screening of AUD and KS patients (Ritz et al, 2021). AUD patients with a low episodic memory score on BEARNI were considered at risk of developing KS (Ritz et al, 2021), suggesting that BEARNI may make possible the early identification of AUD patients at high risk of developing KS.…”

“…It was found to be a reliable predictor of performance on an extensive neuropsychological battery (Ritz, Lannuzel, et al, 2015) and relevant in the cognitive screening of AUD and KS patients (Ritz et al, 2021). AUD patients with a low episodic memory score on BEARNI were considered at risk of developing KS (Ritz et al, 2021), suggesting that BEARNI may make possible the early identification of AUD patients at high risk of developing KS. However, the relationships between performance on BEARNI and structural abnormalities in AUD and KS patients remain unknown.…”

Using Literary Works to Teach Psychopathology: A Qualitative Document Analysis Regarding Alcohol Use Disorder

“…After drinking alcohol, the stimulation of this reward system causes this behaviour to be reinforced, and thus addiction occurs (Horseman & Meyer, 2019). Long-term drinking with addiction causes severe mental health problems such as "Korsakoff Syndrome" (Ritz et al, 2021) and "Delirium Tremens" (Calvo et al, 2018). Especially "delirium tremens", also known as alcohol withdrawal syndrome, occurs after the individual suddenly reduces or quits alcohol, so alcohol addiction becomes more lethal (Sørensen et al, 2019).…”