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The previous volume, The Pathogenesis of Alcoholism: Psychosocial Factors, attempted to describe the interaction of biological, psychological, and social factors that lead to the initiation and perpetuation of alcoholism. The preface to that volume presented our particular view of the bio-. psycho-social interaction as a progressive process in which earlier developments produce new pathogenetic mechanisms, which in turn lead to still other cyclical feedback activities. Although influences from each of the three phenomenologic levels are at work during each stage of the clinical course, it would appear that social factors are most significant in the early phase, psychological factors at the i...
Alcohol use affects, either directly or indirectly, nearly all facets of Western civi lization. Eastern cultures are also not exempt from the influence of alcohol, and the present decade has been a time of increased alcohol use in all parts of the world. The problems of alcohol abuse and alcoholism are of concern to a variety of professionals in the biomedical and psychosocial health sciences, and-although the alcohol research literature contains much information on the relationships between alcohol ingestion and physiological, neurochemical, pharmacologic, genetic, environmental, and psychological effects in humans and in subhuman spe cies-there is at the present time no advanced textbook that integrates the avail able information for use by both students and professionals. The writing of Medical and Social Aspects of Alcohol Abuse constitutes an attempt to create a scholarly reference and resource for students, researchers, prac ticing clinicians, and paraprofessionals who wish to understand the complex inter play of factors related to acute and chronic alcohol intoxication, the effects of alco hol on body functions, and treatment approaches to alcohol abusers and alcoholics.
Alcoholism, the oldest addictive illness, remains a serious problem because of its major modifications of many physiological systems. The genetic and neurological origins and mechanisms are complex and only partly understood. However, it is clear that alcohol use modifies the production of most hormones, directly and indirectly modulating the systems that hormones regulate. Acute and chronic alcohol consumption affects virtually all cellular functions of tissues like brain, liver, immune system, and reproductive and endocrine organs. The latter have major regula tory roles, affecting many functions from development to repro duction. Although stress can further modify alcohol's effects on hor...
Alcohol and other drugs of abuse are major contributing factors to liver disease and its pathology. Alcoholic cirrhosis causes thousands of deaths each year in the United States, and encourages liver replacement. A better understanding of the mechanisms of liver pathology will significantly aid basic researchers and physicians in treating and preventing liver damage. This book is designed especially for those researchers wishing to understand alcoholic liver disease. Therefore the role of alcohol in changing nutrition and its nutritional effects on liver disease are reviewed. The generation of free radicals during alcohol use has been found to be an important cause of membrane changes, of ca...
Alcohol abuse ranks among the most common and also the most severe environmental hazards to human health. Its significance is heightened by the possibility of prevention by elimination of the habit, however, rarely exerted. The incidence of deleterious effects on human health has relentlessly risen in the past years for a variety of factors. They include migration of populations and, particularly, increased urbanization. Thus, in some parts of the world, population groups previously spared have become involved, which is also re flected in the increasing number of breweries and distilleries in the developing countries. Social, religious, and gender-related barriers to alcohol consumption are ...