Neuroscientist studies connection between PTSD and alcohol abuse
Approximately eight million people in the United States live with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), according to the National Center for PTSD, and nearly 75% of them report abusing alcohol at one time or another.
Justin Gass, Ph.D., a researcher in MUSC’s Department of Neuroscience and Alcohol Research Center, said alcohol may work for a night, tricking the brain with a flood of short-lived endorphins, but that ultimately it just makes things worse.
People often learn early in life that [using alcohol] can ease a hard day or make you feel better. It’s a coping mechanism,” he explained.
But when someone develops PTSD, they often start [using alcohol] more and more.
Our working theory is that repeated alcohol use makes fear memories worse, which in turn leads to more alcohol consumption. It’s a vicious cycle.”
Understanding the brain
Gass’ new $1.7 million grant from the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism, part of the National Institutes of Health, will allow him to pinpoint which areas of the brain are involved in processing fear memories and learn just how alcohol affects them. He hopes he may even identify possible treatments that can break the cycle of dependency and help PTSD sufferers overcome their traumatic memories.
Psychologists have been studying how memories are formed and stored since the late 1800s, and they still understand very little of how the process works.
We know that whenever a memory is formed, new synapses, or connections, are created between neurons,” Gass said.
Neurons are brain cells that “talk” by generating electrical signals and releasing chemicals called neurotransmitters. The connections they form with other neurons are the basis of everything you remember, from your first kiss to how to tie your shoes.
Whenever you recall a memory from long-term storage, there is a window of time in which it can be altered,” Gass said.
And that’s our opportunity to fix it, disrupt it, or change it before it gets reconsolidated into long-term memory.”
While that might just mean updating a memory of one’s spouse to include a new haircut, for someone with PTSD, it could be the key to treatment. By recalling a traumatic memory in a safe environment, it can be reconsolidated into long-term memory in a less impactful way.
Gass and his team are using these methods to investigate novel ways to potentially treat alcohol/PTSD comorbidity. A type of treatment known as exposure therapy has been used since the 1950s to tackle phobias and anxiety disorders. A new spin on this traditional treatment is the use of cognitive enhancing drugs to speed up the process by decreasing the time it takes to form new memories to compete with the old ones.
Breaking the vicious cycle of alcohol and PTSD
Another key is to break the vicious cycle of post-traumatic stress and alcohol abuse. Repeated exposure to alcohol interferes with both types of treatment by causing memories to grow stronger rather than weaker over time. No one is yet sure exactly how or why, but it may involve the connections between neurons in the brain. Solving that mystery is one of the major goals of the research project.
As more soldiers return every year from war and an increasing number of people report abuse at one time or another in their lives, this work will likely be an important first step toward breaking a vicious cycle that traps too many in a downward spiral of alcohol abuse, anxiety and despair.