Cerebral edema in drug addicts

Abstract

Background/Aim. The effect of drugs leaves permanent consequences on the brain, organic in type, followed by numerous manifestations, and it significantly affects the development of mental dysfunctions. The clinicians are often given a task to estimate a patient?s personality during treatment or during experts estimate of a drug addict. The aim of this research was to determine the differences, if any, in characteristics of addicts experience and personality traits in drug addicts with or without cerebral edema. Methods. The research was conducted on a sample of 252 male drug addicts, the average age of 23.3 (SD = 4.3) years. Cerebral edema was confirmed on magnetic resonance (MR) images of the brain performed during the treatment of the addicts. The participants were tested by the psychologists using Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory (MMPI-201) test, and the data were processed using canonical discriminate analysis within the SPSS program. The dependent variable in the study was cerebral edema. A block of independent variables, designed for the requirements of this study, consisted of two subgroups. The first one consisted of 12 variables describing the relevant characteristics of drug abuse. The second subgroup consisted of 8 psychopathological tendencies in the personality defined by the mentioned test. Results. Cerebral edema was confirmed in 52 (20.63%) of the drug addicts. The differences between the groups of drug addicts with and without cerebral edema were determined in the following: the time span of taking drugs (0.301), use of alcohol parallel with drugs (0.466), and treatment for addiction (0.603). In the drug addicts with a cerebral edema, MMPI-201 confirmed the increase in the scales for hypochondria, psychopathic deviations and psychastenia, and the decrease in the scales for schizophrenia and depression. Conclusion. Our study confirmed a possible connection between cerebral edema and personality traits in a number of the examined drug addicts. Considering the fact that practice often requires personality estimation, regardless whether it is about treatment or expert?s estimate, it is necessary to further research in this direction.Uvod/Cilj. Dejstvo droge ostavlja trajne posledice organskog tipa, na mozak, pracene brojnim neuroloskim manifestacijama, i bitno utice na razvoj psihickih poremecaja. Klinicarima se cesto postavlja zadatak da procene licnost tokom lecenja ili vestacenja zavisnika od droge. Cilj istrazivanja bio je utvrdjivanje karakteristika narkomanskog staza i osobina licnosti kod zavisnika od droge sa i bez edema mozga. Metode. Istrazivanje je sprovedeno u grupi od 252 zavisnika od droge muskog pola, prosecne starosti 23,3 (SD = 4,3) godine. Za vreme lecenja zavisnika od droge radjena je magnetna rezonanca mozga, a za procenu psihopatoloskih tendencija licnosti koriscen je Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory (MMPI-201) test. Za obradu podataka koriscena je kanonicka diskriminativna analiza u sklopu SPSS programa. Zavisna varijabla u istrazivanju bio je edem mozga. Blok nezavisnih varijabli, sacinjen za potrebe ovog istrazivanja, sastojao se od dve podgrupe. Prvu je cinilo 12 varijabli kojima se opisuju relevantna obelezja zavisnosti od droga. Drugu je cinilo 8 psihopatoloskih tendencija licnosti definisanih pomenutim testom. Rezultati. Edem mozga utvrdjen je kod 52 (20,63%) zavisnika od droge. Razlike izmedju grupa zavisnika od droge sa i bez edema mozga utvrdjene su u duzini narkomanskog staza (0,301), koriscenju alkohola paralelno sa drogama (0,466) i lecenju zavisnosti (0,603). Kod zavisnika od droge sa cerebralnim edemom na MMPI-201 testu utvrdjene su povisene skale hipohondrije, psihopatske devijacije i psihastenije, a snizenje skala sizofrenije i depresije. Zakljucak. Kod jednog broja ispitivanih zavisnika od droge potvrdjena je sumnja u mogucnost povezanosti edema mozga i osobina licnosti. S obzirom na to da praksa cesto iziskuje potrebu za procenom licnosti, bilo da se radi o lecenju ili vestacenju, neophodno je nastaviti istrazivanja u ovom pravcu.