Clinical and electrophysiologic study of the brain and peripheral nerves disorders in chronic alcoholism

The remarkable polymorphism shown by neurologic complications due to chronic alcoholism defines the objective of the present study. We attempted to make our own clinical and electrophysiologic interpretation of these complications using, along with the routine methods of investigation, some advanced electromyographic techniques such as motor evoked potential, single fiber electromyography, and a quantitative analysis of needle EMG. The study included 47 patients with neurologic complications due to chronic alcoholism treated in the Department of Neurology at the Medical University, Plovdiv over a period of 5 years. The results showed a high frequency of both the clinical and the subclinical lesions affecting the nervous systems at different levels. The modern clinical electromyography has allowed us to make a complete functional characteristics of a peripheral and central motor neuron in such a polymorphic pathology as that of the chronic alcoholism.