Alcohol Withdrawal
There are quite a few different but not mutually
exclusive clinical alcohol withdrawal symptoms and signs of alcohol
withdrawal:
- Tremulousness: "the shakes"
- Activation syndrome: typified by
tremulousness, agitation, rapid heart beat and high
blood pressure.
- Seizures: acute grand mal seizures can
arise in alcohol withdrawal in patients who have no
history of seizure or any structural brain ailments.
- Hallucinations: typically visual or
tactile in alcoholics
- Delirium tremens: can be severe and often
deadly.
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Unlike withdrawal from drugs such as heroin, which
can be very nasty but is rarely deadly, alcohol withdrawal can kill (by
uncontrolled convulsions) if it is not appropriately supervised by a
medical professional. The pharmacological management of alcohol
withdrawal is a result of the fact that alcohol, barbiturates and
benzodiazepines have amazingly comparable effects on the brain and can
be replaced for each other. Since benzodiazepines are the safest of the
three classes of drugs, alcohol use is stopped and a long-acting
benzodiazepine is substituted to impede the alcohol withdrawal symptoms.
The benzodiazepine dosage is then reduced gradually over a period of
days or weeks.
