Clinton wrote this …
James Garbutt was on ABC’s Good Morning America today responding to a story about a French cardiologist who claims a single medication, baclofen, helped him control his addiction to alcohol. (The BBC also ran the story.)
The book may be new; the discussion isn’t. See this JAMA letter.
Garbutt is a professor of Psychiatry and medical director of the Alcohol and Substance Abuse Program and an investigator in UNC’s Bowles Center for Alcohol Studies.
Baclofen is not a cure, Garbutt says, but he and others have found that it does a good job of controlling the negative side effects people with alcoholism experience as they begin to abstain.
Garbutt was lead author of one of the first published trials of long-acting Naltrexone, and, with Dr. Alexie Kampov of UNC, has investigated the role of “sweet-liking” as a risk factor for alcoholism and as a predictor of response to Naltrexone. He has conducted the only double-blind trial of baclofen in the US and is currently leading a placebo-controlled trial of the drug combine with Naltrexone.
He told ABC, “If you put baclofen and Naltrexone together, you get a bigger bang for your buck.”
i drank gin on bacolfen. i have also quit drinking on bacolfen. i have been on bacolfen 26+years since my accident. i think i used willpower to stop imbibing, but who knows. i hope bacolfen does indeed work for alcoholics and their loved ones, because alcohol ruins ppl’s lives.
I agree that baclofen is very effective in taking the edge off, especially in the early weeks and months of sobriety. I applaud people like Dr. Ameisen for being brave enough to step outside the box.
I am fortunate to have a doctor who is very open-minded. I explained my situation and then showed him the book. I also printed out several web articles for him to see the proof. Thankfully, he started me on a fairly high dose and then raised it again after a month when he realized I was OK with it.
Thanks for the post!
Thanks for your comment, Shawn. We’re glad you found this post helpful.