Anna Grzywacz
Pomeranian Medical University, Poland
Title: Genetic determinants of psychoactive substances addiction research on the endophenotype associated with a lack of the reward system in the drug: Addicted population
Biography
Biography: Anna Grzywacz
Abstract
Chemical compounds, which are potentially addictive, are distinguished by their capacity to stimulate dopamine release, e.g. in the nucleus accumbens and via other neural pathways. Additionally, a combination of unfavorable external factors, including stress and failure, with hereditarily weakened dopaminergic conductivity in the reward system results in a heightened sensitivity to the occurrence of addictions. We define impulsivity as 'acting under pressure', which follows the definition provided by Baratt in 1990. Impulsivity is more and more often recognized as a psychological trait and feasible endophenotype. In the search for endophenotypes of addiction to psychostimulants, which can be related to impulsivity, it was observed that not only does it result from the very contact with a substance, but it is a factor which increases the risk of this substance abuse. Impulsivity is highly heritable. It is not always that the addicted take a particular substance because it gives them pleasure, but they do it because they are under pressure created by a strong motivation originating from sensitization. A repetitive intake of a substance results in consolidated neuroadaptive changes which can trigger craving for drugs in response to the conditional stimuli from the environment. The consolidated receptor changes in the dopaminergic system on which sensitization is based can contribute to the increased risk of recurrence.
Aims:
1. Identifying the phenotype related to the dopamine transmission deficiency in the OUN which predisposes to addiction to psychoactive substances.
2. Indicating the necessity for extending screening diagnostics for a predisposition to addiction with psychobiological parameters (impulsivity, attention deficit, hyperactivity).
Scientific benefits: 1. Our research would make it possible to extend knowledge on biological reasons for susceptibility to the occurrence of disorders related to narcotic substances abuse and addiction to them. 2. Our research corresponds with the research tendencies in the modern neuropsychiatry in which endophenotypes recognized as markers of susceptibility to the occurrence of a particular mental disorder in the context of susceptibility- stress model are incessantly searched for. 3. Identification of the marker of susceptibility to the occurrence of addiction in the dopaminergic system would provide reasons to extend diagnostics of the addicted people with disorders which relate to the weakened dopaminergic conductivity and therefore extend possibilities of preventive and the therapeutic measures.