Cocaine Addiction and Changes in the Brain
Research made it clear long ago that long-term cocaine abuse and cocaine addiction create significant changes in the brain, changes that cannot always be reversed in treatment. A recent study suggests that those changes aren’t just in cognitive function in general but also in the memory sector in particular.
Neuron is a scientific journal and in it was recently published a study that followed the effects of cocaine addiction on rats. The study showed that there are psychological changes that occur in the brain during addictive cocaine abuse and these changes are likely the cause of memory changes. Long-lasting cellular memories were found to be triggered in the brain by cocaine abuse – but only if the patient used the drug of their own accord.
Here’s how it works: at UCSF, Billy Chen and Antonello Bonci led teams that taught three groups of rats to press levers that would bring them sugar, food, or cocaine. In a fourth group of rats, they injected cocaine. Upon examining the brain tissue of all groups of rats, they learned that there was an increase in the synaptic strength in the reward center for the rats who voluntarily consumed cocaine, sugar, and food. The consequent cellular memories were short-lived in those rats that opted for food or sugar over cocaine, but in the rats who developed a voluntary cocaine addiction, those memories – and that change in the synaptic structure – remained for up to three months after they stopped taking the cocaine. The rats that had been injected with cocaine showed no changes in their synaptic structures in the reward system of the brain or changes in memory function.
What does this show? The study shows that addiction is more than just the presence of an addictive drug in the system. Those that choose to continually take cocaine and develop an addiction as a result have a psychological component to that addiction. Without it, even regular use of the drug doesn’t provoke the same changes in the brain. Says Antonello Bonci: “Instead the motivation for taking the drug seems to be a key component in the process as well.”
The next step? Researchers are now focused on taking this newly proven fact a step farther: they are working on how to remove the long-term memory associations that occur due to voluntary cocaine abuse and addiction. This kind of research could help us develop new cocaine addiction treatment methods that actually remove the desire to continue to abuse the drug.
In the meantime, cocaine rehab is an effective treatment plan for those living with an active cocaine addiction. A comprehensive program will provide medical detox and psychological addiction treatment to provide patients with what they need to effectively fight addiction. Call now for more information.
