Concomitants of alcoholism: differential effects of thiamine deficiency, liver damage, and food deprivation on the rat brain in vivo

Rationale Serious neurological concomitants of alcoholism include Wernicke’s encephalopathy (WE), Korsakoff’s syndrome (KS), and hepatic encephalopathy (HE). Objectives This study was conducted in animal models to determine neuroradiological signatures associated with liver damage caused by carbon tetrachloride (CCl 4 ), thiamine deficiency caused by pyrithiamine treatment, and nonspecific nutritional deficiency caused by food deprivation. Methods Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) and magnetic resonance spectroscopy (MRS) were used to evaluate brains of wild-type Wistar rats at baseline and following treatment. Results Similar to observations in ethanol (EtOH) exposure models, thiamine deficiency caused enlargement of the lateral ventricles. Liver damage was not associated with effects on cerebrospinal fluid volumes, whereas food deprivation caused modest enlargement of the cisterns. In contrast to what has repeatedly been shown in EtOH exposure models, in which levels of choline-containing compounds (Cho) measured by MRS are elevated, Cho levels in treated animals in all three experiments (i.e., liver damage, thiamine deficiency, and food deprivation) were lower than those in baseline or controls. Conclusions These results add to the growing body of literature suggesting that MRS-detectable Cho is labile and can depend on a number of variables that are not often considered in human experiments. These results also suggest that reductions in Cho observed in humans with alcohol use disorder (AUD) may well be due to mild manifestations of concomitants of AUD such as liver damage or nutritional deficiencies and not necessarily to alcohol consumption per se.