New Directions in Medication-Facilitated Behavioral Treatment for Substance Use Disorders

Behavioral therapies targeting reward mechanisms in substance use disorders

Behavioral therapies are considered best practices in the treatment of substance use disorders (SUD) and used as first-line approaches for SUDs without FDA-approved pharmacotherapies. Decades of research on the neuroscience of drug reward and addiction have informed the development of current leading behavioral therapies that, while differing in focus and technique, have in common the overarching goal of shifting reward responding away from drug and toward natural non-drug rewards. This review begins by describing key neurobiological processes of reward in addiction, followed by a description of how various behavioral therapies address specific reward processes. Based on this review, a conceptual 'map' is crafted to pinpoint gaps and areas of overlap, serving as a guide for selecting and integrating behavioral therapies.

Efficacy of ketamine intervention to decrease alcohol use, cravings, and withdrawal symptoms in adults with problematic alcohol use or alcohol use disorder: A systematic review and comprehensive analysis of mechanism of actions

BACKGROUND

Alcohol use disorder is highly prevalent and has important economical, societal, psychiatric, and medical consequences. All currently approved therapeutic approaches targeting alcohol dependence have relatively modest effects and high relapse rates. Recent evidence suggests that ketamine may be an effective intervention to treat alcohol use disorder and alcoholic withdrawal. This systematic review aimed to assess the current level of evidence for this intervention.

METHODS

This systematic review was carried out following the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) guidelines and was registered on the international database of systematic reviews PROSPERO. Medline(Ovid), CINAHL Complete(EBSCOhost), PsycINFO(Ovid), EBM Reviews(Ovid), EMBASE(Ovid), and Google Scholar were searched for studies using ketamine to treat harmful alcohol use, craving, or withdrawal states in humans. Studies of any methodology that evaluated ketamine in isolation or combination with other interventions were included. The risk of bias was assessed using specific Cochrane critical appraisal tools.

RESULTS

Of 1922 abstracts identified, 8 full-text articles were eligible for inclusion, yielding a total sample size of 634 participants. Five studies investigated the impact of ketamine on alcohol use and/or cravings and/or withdrawal in outpatient settings. Three studies looked at the effect of adding ketamine to conventional treatment of withdrawal symptoms in participants admitted to intensive care unit for severe alcohol withdrawal. Results on primary outcomes were mixed within and across trials.

CONCLUSIONS

Despite promising results, the current evidence does not permit definitive conclusions about the efficacy of ketamine in alcohol use disorders or withdrawal. Future studies are warranted.

Toward Synergies of Ketamine and Psychotherapy

Ketamine is a dissociative drug that has been used medically since the 1970s primarily as an anesthetic agent but also for various psychiatric applications. Anecdotal reports and clinical research suggest substantial potential for ketamine as a treatment in conjunction with psychological interventions. Here, we review historical and modern approaches to the use of ketamine with psychotherapy, discuss the clinical relevance of ketamine’s acute psychoactive effects, propose a unique model for using esketamine (one isomeric form of ketamine) with Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT), and suggest considerations for moving medication-assisted psychotherapy forward as a field.

Targeting white matter neuroprotection as a relapse prevention strategy for treatment of cocaine use disorder: Design of a mechanism-focused randomized clinical trial

Cocaine use continues to be a significant public health problem with limited treatment options and no approved pharmacotherapies. Cognitive-behavioral therapy (CBT) remains the mainstay treatment for preventing relapse, however, people with chronic cocaine use display cognitive impairments that are associated with poor response to CBT. Emerging evidence in animal and human studies suggests that the peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor-gamma (PPAR- γ) agonist, pioglitazone, improves white matter integrity that is essential for cognitive function. This project will determine whether adjunctive use of pioglitazone enhances the effect of CBT in preventing relapse during the early phase of recovery from cocaine use disorder. This paper describes the design of a mechanism-focused phase 2 randomized clinical trial that aims first to evaluate the effects of pioglitazone on targeted mechanisms related to white matter integrity, cognitive function, and cocaine craving; and second, to evaluate the extent to which improvements on target mechanisms predict CBT response. Positive results will support pioglitazone as a potential cognitive enhancing agent to advance to later stage medication development research.

A Review of Nonanesthetic Uses of Ketamine

Ketamine, a nonselective NMDA receptor antagonist, is used widely in medicine as an anesthetic agent. However, ketamine's mechanisms of action lead to widespread physiological effects, some of which are now coming to the forefront of research for the treatment of diverse medical disorders. This paper aims at reviewing recent data on key nonanesthetic uses of ketamine in the current literature. MEDLINE, CINAHL, and Google Scholar databases were queried to find articles related to ketamine in the treatment of depression, pain syndromes including acute pain, chronic pain, and headache, neurologic applications including neuroprotection and seizures, and alcohol and substance use disorders. It can be concluded that ketamine has a potential role in the treatment of all of these conditions. However, research in this area is still in its early stages, and larger studies are required to evaluate ketamine's efficacy for nonanesthetic purposes in the general population.

A Single Ketamine Infusion Combined With Mindfulness-Based Behavioral Modification to Treat Cocaine Dependence: A Randomized Clinical Trial

OBJECTIVE

Research has suggested that subanesthetic doses of ketamine may work to improve cocaine-related vulnerabilities and facilitate efforts at behavioral modification. The purpose of this trial was to test whether a single ketamine infusion improved treatment outcomes in cocaine-dependent adults engaged in mindfulness-based relapse prevention.

METHODS

Fifty-five cocaine-dependent individuals were randomly assigned to receive a 40-minute intravenous infusion of ketamine (0.5 mg/kg) or midazolam (the control condition) during a 5-day inpatient stay, during which they also initiated a 5-week course of mindfulness-based relapse prevention. Cocaine use was assessed through self-report and urine toxicology. The primary outcomes were end-of-study abstinence and time to relapse (defined as first use or dropout).

RESULTS

Overall, 48.2% of individuals in the ketamine group maintained abstinence over the last 2 weeks of the trial, compared with 10.7% in the midazolam group (intent-to-treat analysis). The ketamine group was 53% less likely (hazard ratio=0.47; 95% CI=0.24, 0.92) to relapse (dropout or use cocaine) compared with the midazolam group, and craving scores were 58.1% lower in the ketamine group throughout the trial (95% CI=18.6, 78.6); both differences were statistically significant. Infusions were well tolerated, and no participants were removed from the study as a result of adverse events.

CONCLUSIONS

A single ketamine infusion improved a range of important treatment outcomes in cocaine-dependent adults engaged in mindfulness-based behavioral modification, including promoting abstinence, diminishing craving, and reducing risk of relapse. Further research is needed to replicate these promising results in a larger sample.

Frustration Tolerance and Personality Traits in Patients With Substance Use Disorders

Previous research has suggested the prevalence of certain personality traits, some of which are related to a disorganized attachment, in substance abuse disorders. Further, frustration tolerance (FT) has been proposed as an important factor in addiction, both at the inception-following the "self-medication" hypothesis-and regarding treatment compliance. In turn, an inadequate response to frustrating events has been also associated with a disrupted attachment. Our goal is to explore the mediational role of FT in the relationship between personality traits and two different treatments for substance addiction: therapeutic community (TC) and ambulatory treatment (AT). Eighty-four subjects with substance abuse disorder were recruited in total (22 female), including 46 volunteers (13 female) in TC and 38 (9 female) in AT. They were assessed with Rosenzweig's test for FT and the Millon Clinical Multiaxial Inventory-III (MCMI-III) test to evaluate personality factors. By comparing with a control sample (335 volunteers, 268 female), we found that FT was lower in patients. Between therapeutic groups, FT was significantly lower in TC. Depressive, antisocial, sadistic, negativistic, schizotypal, borderline, paranoid, anxiety, dysthymia, alcohol use, drug use, posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), thought disorder, and delusional disorder traits were suggestive of pathology in the clinical samples and were significantly different between control, AT, and TC groups. Further, anxiety and PTSD traits were higher in TC than in AT. A mediational analysis revealed that the effect of anxiety and PTSD scales on therapeutic group was partially mediated by FT. In conclusion, FT and its interplay with personality traits commonly related to disorganized attachment (anxiety and PTSD) might be important factors to consider within therapeutic programs for persons with substance addiction.