Withdrawal seizures in black and white alcoholic patients: intellectual and neuropsychological sequelae

An investigation was made of whether black alcoholics have a different response to having withdrawal seizures than white alcoholics, in terms of cognitive and other neuropsychological deficits. In a previous study it was found that white alcoholics with histories of withdrawal seizures did not demonstrate neuropsychological differences from white alcoholic patients without such histories. However, the apparently higher incidence of withdrawal seizures among blacks noted during screening of subjects for this study raised the question of whether the consequences of the seizure history might be different among blacks. The Halstead-Reitan Neuropsychological Test Battery was administered to 22 white and 20 black alcoholic inpatients. Half of each group had a history of withdrawal seizures while the other half did not. The results of the study indicated that on several tests, there were significant differences between black patients with and without seizure histories, but that was not the case for the white patients. Various possible causes for this finding are discussed.