Effect of brain structure, brain function, and brain connectivity on relapse in alcohol-dependent patients.

Context: In alcohol-dependent patients, brain atrophy and functional brain activation elicited by alcohol-associated stimuli may predict relapse. However, to date, the interaction between both factors has not been studied.

Objective: To determine whether results from structural and functional magnetic resonance imaging are associated with relapse in detoxified alcohol-dependent patients.

Design: A cue-reactivity functional magnetic resonance experiment with alcohol-associated and neutral stimuli. After a follow-up period of 3 months, the group of 46 detoxified alcohol-dependent patients was subdivided into 16 abstainers and 30 relapsers.

Setting: Faculty for Clinical Medicine Mannheim at the University of Heidelberg, Germany.

Participants: A total of 46 detoxified alcohol-dependent patients and 46 age- and sex-matched healthy control subjects

Main outcome measures: Local gray matter volume, local stimulus-related functional magnetic resonance imaging activation, joint analyses of structural and functional data with Biological Parametric Mapping, and connectivity analyses adopting the psychophysiological interaction approach.

Results: Subsequent relapsers showed pronounced atrophy in the bilateral orbitofrontal cortex and in the right medial prefrontal and anterior cingulate cortex, compared with healthy controls and patients who remained abstinent. The local gray matter volume-corrected brain response elicited by alcohol-associated vs neutral stimuli in the left medial prefrontal cortex was enhanced for subsequent relapsers, whereas abstainers displayed an increased neural response in the midbrain (the ventral tegmental area extending into the subthalamic nucleus) and ventral striatum. For alcohol-associated vs neutral stimuli in abstainers compared with relapsers, the analyses of the psychophysiological interaction showed a stronger functional connectivity between the midbrain and the left amygdala and between the midbrain and the left orbitofrontal cortex.

Conclusions: Subsequent relapsers displayed increased brain atrophy in brain areas associated with error monitoring and behavioral control. Correcting for gray matter reductions, we found that, in these patients, alcohol-related cues elicited increased activation in brain areas associated with attentional bias toward these cues and that, in patients who remained abstinent, increased activation and connectivity were observed in brain areas associated with processing of salient or aversive stimuli.