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Love hormone has sobering effect


Animal studies suggest oxytocin may be a useful drug to treat alcoholism (Source: ejwhite /iStockphoto)

Sobering oxytocin The mammalian bonding hormone oxytocin prevents rats from becoming intoxicated by alcohol, a new study has found.

The findings could pave the way for the development of drugs that help treat alcoholism in humans.

"We found that oxytocin blocks alcohol's intoxicating effects and it prevents alcohol from acting at the sites in the brain that are involved in alcohol's intoxicating effects," says team member Dr Michael Bowen, from the University of Sydney's School of Psychology.

The findings, reported today in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, were quite "serendipitous" says Bowen.

He and colleagues first twigged to the discovery while observing the movement of drunk and sober rats in a different study.

The study looked at the role of oxytocin in blocking the alcohol-induced release of dopamine.

Sober rats wandered around their enclosure, while those that had been given alcohol just sat heavily sedated with their nose in the corner of the enclosure.

Interestingly, however, a third group of rats that had been given oxytocin prior to consuming alcohol also wandered around like normal curious rats.

"No one had ever reported this before and it was almost completely unexpected," says Bowen.

Sobriety tests

Bowen and colleagues repeated these tests and carried out further tests including studying how long the rats could hang upside down from a wire grid.

"The rats that were sober could hold on for about 10 to 15 seconds," says Bowen. "The rats that had alcohol could only hold on for about two seconds."

Rats treated with oxytocin, however were able to hold on for about 10 seconds.

"So it almost completely reversed the effect of the alcohol," he says.

This suggests oxytocin somehow prevents the intoxicating effects of alcohol, which include overly-relaxed muscles.

Bowen and colleagues then studied in vitro the delta-subunit GABA-A receptors that alcohol is known to bind to cause intoxication. When they applied alcohol the receptors gave a very big response but then they were able to block that response with the oxytocins.

Recent previous research has shown that oxytoxin may also reduce alcohol consumption, craving and withdrawal.

"The present study shows a previously unidentified mechanism through which some of these effects may occur," write Bowen and colleagues.

Treating alcoholism

Bowen says oxytocin shows potential to treat alcoholism.

"Each year in Australia there are 65,000 hospitalisations and 1,500 deaths due to alcohol-related injuries and a significant proportion of those injuries and deaths are sustained by alcoholics," says Bowen.

"Here's a drug that potentially could make you less likely to consume alcohol and then, if you do consume the alcohol, less intoxicated and much less likely to be injured.

"Of course the challenge is translating these findings to humans now and that's something we plan to attempt in the near future."

Bowen says the "beautiful thing" about oxytocins is that it has been used as a labour-inducing drug for a long time and been rigorously tested for safety.

"That has meant that getting human studies up and running has been a lot easier."

Bowen and colleagues have patents on oxytocin as a treatment for reducing alcohol consumption. Their current research was funded by Australia's National Health and Medical Research Council and the German Research Council.

Tags: pharmaceuticals, alcohol