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A Protocol for Measuring Cue Reactivity in a Rat Model of Cocaine Use Disorder
Published on: June 18, 2018
Cocaine users differ from normals on cognitive tasks which show poorer performance during drug abstinence
Edward F Pace-Schott1, Peter T Morgan, Robert T Malison
1Department of Psychiatry, Harvard Medical School and Center for Sleep and Cognition, Beth Israel-Deaconess Medical Center, Boston, Massachusetts 02115, USA. epacesch@bidmc.harvard.edu
Abstract:
Seventeen non-treatment seeking cocaine-dependent individuals participated in three-week longitudinal inpatient studies of cognitive changes during drug use and abstinence. Protocols included three days drug-free baseline, three days cocaine self-administration, and two weeks complete abstinence. A repeatable cognitive battery showed attention and delayed verbal recognition memory but not working memory to be impaired in cocaine users compared to age- and sex-matched normative values. Attention was significantly poorer during the first and second week of abstinence compared to days on which cocaine was used suggesting that certain cocaine-induced impairments may be acutely normalized by cocaine use, but resurface during abstinence.
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