Alternatively, presentation of treatment-related information should be delayed until tests indicate some improvement in cognitive function. M.D. Awareness of alcohol's effects on cognition can help general health care providers identify alcoholics and refer them to appropriate treatment. Awareness also can assist the efforts of alcoholism treatment personnel to maximize the potential benefit of treatment for their patients. In general health care situations, practitioners should use standard alcoholism assessment instruments to determine the extent of alcohol use by patients who show signs of cognitive dysfunction. Patients in whom alcohol use is identified as either a primary or a contributing cause of cognitive dysfunction must be referred to alcoholism treatment.
Evidence suggests that some cognitive impairment in alcoholics is reversible.
Moreover, cognitive deterioration will worsen with continued drinking. In addition, alcoholism treatment personnel should know that alcohol-induced cognitive impairment may make it difficult during the first weeks of absence for some of their patients to benefit from exposure to the full range of treatment services. Although it may not be possible or necessary for treatment programs to administer extensive neuropsychiatric tests to all patients, a simple test of the patient's ability to benefit from the didactic elements of alcoholism treatment can be made. One test might be to determine what a patient remembers from an initial counseling session. If there is evidence of cognitive deficiency, patients must be allowed time to recover adequate cognitive function so that, at a minimum, information provided during treatment can be retained.