Alcohol damages female brains three times faster

WOMEN with alcohol dependency experience damage to serotonin brain function at three times the rate of male counterparts, a Swedish study has shown.

Women experience a 50% reduction in parts of the brain governing mood  and sleep function after four years of excessive drinking, while men do not show a similar amount of damage until 12 years of alcohol abuse, according to the study by researchers at University of Gothenburg.

"The impairment is progressing much faster in women," explained Kristina Berglund, who conducted the study with colleagues from the university's Department of Psychology, as well as two researchers at the faculty of Health Sciences, known as the Sahlgrenska Academy.

The researchers studied several brain functions of 42 people – a third of them women – who admitted to alcohol dependency, along with 28 control subjects.

"We saw that the alcohol dependent individuals had significantly lower serotonin functions," Ms Berglund told AFP.

The women tested said they on average had been drinking the equivalent of about 12 bottles of wine a week for four years, while the men had been drinking the same amount, but for 12 years.

“[However], we could see the damage to the serotonin function was equal between men and women," Ms Berglund said.

The results, due to be published in January in the Journal of Alcoholism: Clinical and Experimental Research, had come as a partial surprise to the researchers, she said.

"We were not surprised to find that the serotonin function was impaired in the alcohol-dependent individuals, but we were surprised to see that women were so much more vulnerable, even in the brain," she said.

Ulf Berggren, one of the Sahlgrenska Academy contributors to the study, meanwhile stressed that while the timing was different, men ultimately suffered the same degree of harm to their serotonin function as women.

The study authors acknowledged more research was needed, especially since they had used such a small number of test subjects.