Gambling addicts may soon have recourse to a little brain surgery to cure them of their habit.
It’s not as far-fetched as it sounds.
A research team at Stanford University Medical Center has written a paper that appeared recently in the journal Proceedings of the National Academies of Sciences exploring the potential for using brain implants to prevent addictive and compulsive behaviors.
Led by Dr. Casey Halpern, an assistant professor of neurosurgery, the team found that electrical signals in the brain could predict some pathological behaviors.
It was studies of mice that had learned to over-eat fatty foods that led the researchers to detect a distinct pattern of electrical activity in the rodent brains that occurred just seconds before they would start to binge. The researchers then implanted electrodes into the brains of the mice that sent a 10-second electrical pulse into the region of the brain known for activating pleasure and reward. The result: the over-eating in the mice was dramatically reduced.
The researchers then found similar patterns in the brain of a man who already had a cranial implant to treat a severe case of obsessive-compulsive disorder. This suggested to the team that a similar mechanism was present in humans.
“I suspect not everybody (would want one), but you’d be surprised how many are willing to get these implants because it could improve their quality of life tremendously,” Halpern said.
For problem gamblers holding out for a less radical approach there may be hope from new research under way in Finland that examines whether a common nasal spray used to treat opiate overdoses could provide a cure.
Researchers there are looking for 130 subjects to participate in a study of the efficacy of naloxone, a prescription medicine, in treating compulsive behaviors. Naxolone has been legal in the United States as a hand-held sprayer since 2014 and has been used in the past for just that purpose.
It has yet to be tested on problem gamblers, but Finland’s National Institute for Health and Welfare has already found some benefit for gamblers from the use of naloxone pills, and they think a nasal spray could be faster-acting and thus more effective.
“If you really want to play, you can use the spray and the urge will go away,” said Hannu Alho, a professor involved in the Finland study. “Preventing the urge with medicine might help them not to play or play for just a bit and then stop.”
