Frontal White Matter Choline-Containing Compounds Increase with Alcohol Consumption and Glutamate Decreases with Increasing Addiction Criteria

Gabriele Ende¹, Derik Hermann², Mareen Hoerst¹, Nuran Tunc-Skarka¹, Gunilla Oberthuer¹, Svenja Wichert², Juri Rabinstein², Wolfgang Weber-Fahr¹, Karl Mann², Sabine Vollstaedt-Klein²

With this 1H MRS study we aimed to investigate correlations between frontal white matter choline-containing compounds and glutamate with alcohol consumption and addictions scores in heavy drinking as well as in non-abstinent alcohol dependent patients. A positive correlation of choline-containing compounds and alcohol consumption could be replicated but the high variance could not be explained by addiction criteria (OCDS, ICD-10 and DSM IV). However, measures of addiction showed significant negative correlations with glutamate in the heavy drinking groups.