ARBD: Evolution and response to treatment based on cognitive variables

In this intervention a comparison of the results obtained, after six months of follow-up, by the patients versus the controls in the battery of cognitive tests for the evaluation of the ARBD will be presented. The patients presented an improvement in anterograde memory, working memory, and in some executive functions. Despite this improvement, the results obtained in these tests were still worse than those obtained by healthy volunteers. No significant relationship was found between the improvement observed in cognitive functions and the variables that measured the response to treatment and the reduction in alcohol consumption. Since the patients did not improve significantly in all the tests, the results cannot be attributed to a mere learning mechanism. These results seem to indicate that at six months of follow-up the improvement in cognitive functions is partial; and that this improvement is related in a global way to the treatment, and not only to achieve alcohol abstinence or reduce alcohol consumption to a normative level, a simple reduction in alcohol consumption seems to be enough for this cognitive improvement.