Cerebral ventricular enlargement. Chronic alcoholics examined by computerized tomography

Computerized tomography was used to measure cerebral ventricular size in hospitalized alcoholic patients, all of whom had evidence of liver disease. Twelve alcoholic patients with neurologic symptoms such as withdrawal seizures, neuropathy, and drug overdose were included. All these patients had normal results from the mental status examinations by the time of discharge. Alcoholic patients had a much higher mean ventricular size compared to 60 control patients. One third of the alcoholics had markedly enlarged ventricles as opposed to only one of the 60 controls.