Effects of repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation on attention to the cues for male patients with alcohol use disorder after acute withdrawal / 中华行为医学与脑科学杂志

ABSTRACT

Objective:To investigate the effect of high-frequency repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation(rTMS)on cue attention in male patients with alcohol use disorder (AUD) after the acute withdrawal.Methods:A total of 90 male patients AUD who were hospitalized in the Second Affiliated Hospital of Kunming Medical University and Psychiatric Hospital of Yunnan province from May 2020 to December 2020 were enrolled, then they were divided into study group and control group using random number table.Because 18 cases fell out during the study, 36 cases were included in each of the two groups.After the alcohol withdrawal syndrome eliminated, the study group received high-frequency rTMS at 10 Hz for 14 consecutive days, and the control group was administrated by sham rTMS.At baseline and after true or sham rTMS, the cognitive psychology experiment Oddball paradigm was completed, and the behavioral data of the subjects were collected.Paired-sample t-test was used to compare the changes of the two groups before and after treatment.Data analysis were conducted using SPSS 21.0 software. Results:There was no statistical difference between the study group and the control group in terms of drinking level, cognition level and demographic data(all P>0.05). In the Oddball paradigm, compared with the control group((526.72±75.30)ms, (0.98±0.02))the reaction time((497.93±64.51)ms, t=3.145, P=0.008) and accuracy rate((0.99±0.01), t=-2.803, P=0.016) in alcohol-related cues were significantly improved in the study group after rTMS intervention, but in the control group, there were no statistical differences(both P>0.05), whether the cue was alcohol related or not. Conclusion:The results suggest that the rTMS can enhance the attention bias of alcohol-related cues and change the impulse process partly.