Researchers Study a New Potential Treatment Method for Cocaine Addiction
Posted under Addiction Treatment on Wednesday, August 25th, 2010
Disulfiram, the generic name for the brand-name drug Antabuse, has been used in medical settings to help people with alcohol dependency stay sober by making them extremely sensitive to alcohol. Five to ten minutes after drinking a small amount of alcohol, patients may experience the effects of a severe hangover, including nausea, vomiting, headache, shortness of breath, and accelerated heart rate that can last from 30 minutes to a several hours.
The drug has also recently been studied as a treatment for cocaine addiction, because it prevents the breakdown of dopamine, a neurotransmitter that plays an important role in addiction. When people taking the drug use cocaine, they experience increased anxiety, higher blood pressure, restlessness, and other negative symptoms.
However, disulfiram inhibits other enzymes in the body and can also damage the liver, according to a new study by Researchers at Emory University School of Medicine. Co-first authors Jason Schroeder, PhD, and graduate student Debra Cooper, along with a team of colleagues, published their results in the journal Neuropsychopharmacology, which suggest that a drug with fewer side effects works in a similar way.
Senior author David Weinshenker, PhD, associate professor of human genetics at Emory University School of Medicine, said that the researchers wanted to figure out how disulfiram works so they could find safer and potentially more effective treatments.
Weinshenker said that cocaine disrupts the dopamine system, which is associated with the pleasurable sensation produced by natural “rewards” such as food or sex, leaving an excess amount of dopamine in the brain. Cocaine also affects another neurotransmitter called norepinephrine, which can trigger stress and cause people to relapse if over-activated.
The researchers found that disulfiram seems to work by inhibiting an enzyme that is required for the production of norepinephrine. A disulfiram dose that lowers the levels of norepinephrine by 40 percent was effective in rats, but doses that didn’t reduce norepinephrine levels didn’t prevent rats from relapsing.
The researchers then tried a drug called nepicastat, which was used to treat congestive heart failure in the ‘90s. According to Weinshenker, this drug also inhibits the norepinephrine-producing enzyme, but doesn’t impair other enzymes like disulfiram does, suggesting that it could be a better treatment method.
Researchers at the University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston are currently studying nepicastat as a treatment method for cocaine addiction.
Source: Science Daily, Experimental Treatments for Cocaine Addiction May Prevent Relapse, August 26, 2010
