Pharmacological treatment in alcohol-, drug- and benzodiazepine-dependent patients - the significance of trazodone
Funk, S.án.
Neuropsychopharmacologia Hungarica a Magyar Pszichofarmakologiai Egyesulet Lapja 15(2): 85-93
2013
ISSN/ISBN: 1419-8711 PMID: 23817359 Document Number: 664011
Currently detoxification of drug and alcohol dependent patients is pharmacologically unresolved, and long-term treatment following the acute phase is also not very successful including a high number of relapses. We would need medications that on the short term cease: the severe vegetative symptoms, the pain, the extremely distressing psychosyndrome characterised by restlessness, anxiety or acute depressive symptoms, and the craving. The optimal would be if there was one medication capable of simultaneously alleviating or diminishing all the above symptoms without causing dependency and preventing relapse in the long-term. Dependency is almost all cases accompanied by primary and/or secondary mood disorder or sleep disorder which should also be treated. It should be considered, however, that following withdrawal of the agent benzodiazepine dependency often develops. The serotonin antagonist and reuptake inhibitor (SARI) trazodone is effective in the treatment of depression accompanied by sleeping disorder and it has also shown efficacy in alcohol and benzodiazepine-dependency. Its administration may improve the efficacy of detoxification and treatment of following conditions, may decrease medication load and the risk of the development of benzodiazepine dependency. In our clinical practice we frequently use this agent to treat our patients simultaneously suffering from depression and addiction problems, gaining experience comparing it to other pharmacotherapies (benzodiazepines or other antidepressants). The medication is not approved for alcohol and drug dependence, however, treatment t of comorbid conditions is not against to the official recommendations. Our aim was, in addition to reviewing the literature, to share our experience which, although cannot be considered an evidence based study, we deemed worthy of publishing. We cannot, at this point, put forward a protocol addressing all related scientific problems and problems of off-label treatment, and we could not so far treat enough patients with trazodone so that our results would be statistically proven. "Acute" and long term treatment of dependency is not sufficiently effective with a substantial relapse rate, which is in part related to the lack of specific medication also for long term treatment. Among the available psychopharmacons, trazodone is a possible choice, since, as based on patients' reports and clinical observations, improvement of their depressive conditions and sleep problems potentially decreases the risk of relapse of drug and alcohol dependence.