Abstract

ABSTRACT:Appropriate medical treatment of alcoholics often falls between the clinical specialties of psychiatry, internal medicine, toxicology, and neurology. All physicians need to have a high index of suspicion for alcoholism, since the diagnosis of alcohol dependence is frequently overlooked. Especially when alcoholics are self-referred to nonmedical agencies, their medical complications may be inadequately treated or unrecognized. Common alcohol-related complications requiring treatment include: (1) clinicopathologic disorders, often associated with the gastroenterologic or cardiorespiratory systems, including alcoholic cirrhosis, (2) peripheral myoneural effects, (3) neuropsychiatric complications (delirium tremens, acute alcoholic hallucinosis, Korsakoff's psychosis, alcoholic dementia), and (4) psychosocial disability.