The Relationship of Alcohol Drinking and Endogenous Opioids: The Opioid Compensation Hypothesis

Berg, B. J.; Volpicelli, Joseph R.; Alterman, Arthur I.; O'Brien, C.

doi:10.1007/978-1-4612-2878-3_12

Cited by 4 publications

(1 citation statement)

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“…Both preclinical and clinical studies suggest that the endogenous opioid system may modulate the intake of alcoholic beverages (Froehlich et al, 1988; Reid & Hunter 1984; Reid, Delconte, Nicols, Bilsky, & Hubbell, 1991; Volpicelli, Davis, & Olgin, 1986). The two major theories of endogenous endorphin modulation of drinking, opioid deficit / compensation hypothesis (Volpicelli, 1987) and opioid surfeit hypothesis (Reid, 1990; Reid et al, 1991), suggest that opiate antagonists’ effects on the endogenous opioid system should decrease baseline levels of alcohol craving, decrease levels of craving after drinking is initiated (Berg, Volpicelli, Alterman, & O’Brien, 1990), or both. Consistent with this hypothesis, Volpicelli and colleagues (1992) found that subjects on naltrexone reported significantly less craving at the end of a 12-week trial than subjects on placebo.…”

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confidence: 99%

Naltrexone, relapse prevention, and supportive therapy with alcoholics: An analysis of patient treatment matching.

Jaffe¹,

Rounsaville²,

Chang³

et al. 1996

Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology

123

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Alcohol-dependent patients (N = 97) were randomly assigned to receive either naltrexone or placebo and either relapse prevention therapy or supportive therapy. The present report explored the hypothesis that patients could be matched to the above treatments on the basis of specific pretreatment characteristics. Treatment matching variables explored included craving, alcohol dependence severity, and cognitive measures of learning and memory. Results of linear regression analyses tentatively suggest that patients experiencing higher levels of craving and poorer cognitive functioning may derive the greatest benefit from naltrexone versus placebo. For psychotherapy, lower levels of verbal learning were associated with poorer drinking outcomes for relapse prevention therapy but not for supportive therapy. Conversely, higher levels of verbal learning were associated with better outcomes for relapse prevention therapy but not for supportive therapy.

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