Alcohol Addiction Controlled by Brain Surgery... 90% Drop in Drinking After Monkey Procedure

Gene Therapy Used in Parkinson's Disease Treatment
"Alcohol Addiction Can Be Treated Without Relapse"

When a gene therapy used for treating Parkinson's disease was applied to alcohol-addicted monkeys, the amount of alcohol consumption decreased by 90% compared to before the procedure.

Red-haired monkey. [Photo by Pixabay]

On the 15th, Professor Christoph Bankiewicz and his research team from Oregon Health & Science University (OHSU) and the Oregon National Primate Research Center (ONPRC) in the United States announced the experimental results on alcohol-addicted monkeys through the medical journal Nature Medicine.

The experiment involved applying a brain procedure used for Parkinson's disease treatment, where the gene for the protein hGDNF was injected into the brain region of alcohol-addicted monkeys, followed by observation of changes in alcohol consumption.

hGDNF is a gene that induces cell proliferation and enhances the function of dopamine-producing neurons in the brain. The researchers hypothesized that since the cause of alcohol addiction is a decrease in dopamine secretion, increasing dopamine secretion would reduce alcohol consumption.

The experiment used eight alcohol-addicted red-tailed monkeys. Four of them were injected with hGDNF, while the remaining four (control group) were injected with saline. The researchers then observed the monkeys through cycles of four weeks without alcohol and four weeks with alcohol.

As a result, the monkeys injected with hGDNF in the brain region showed excessive dopamine secretion, leading to a reduction in alcohol consumption by more than 90% compared to the control group, and their blood alcohol concentration was also very low. In contrast, the control group monkeys showed continuous increases in both alcohol consumption and blood alcohol concentration.

Professor Bankiewicz stated, "Alcohol-addicted patients often relapse with excessive drinking during treatment," and added, "These research results suggest that gene therapy can treat alcohol addiction without relapse into drinking."

However, co-corresponding author Professor Kathleen Grant noted, "This should be limited to the most severe forms of alcohol addiction patients for whom other common treatments are ineffective."

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