[Psychophysiologic interrelations in healthy subjects and alcoholics in remission].

Twenty male patients suffering from alcoholism (10 at the second and 10 at the third stage of disease) at the phase of a remission were subjected to electropolygraphic examination during night sleep and relaxed wakefulness. The mental state was examined by MIL and Spilberger's tests. A control group included 14 normal subjects in whom, additionally to the baseline examinations, the authors studied the effect of a single dose of ethanol taken before sleep on the nonspecific cerebral systems. The latter was associated with an increase in the deep stages of sleep and a reduction of the phase of rapid sleep as well as a decrease of the activation parameters. The electropolygraphic and psychological characteristics in patients with alcoholism of stage II and III showed no significant differences, yet both groups differed considerably from healthy subjects which was expressed in the intensified desynchronization of the cerebral bioelectrical activity in both sleep and wakefulness and in the presence of anxiety-depressive disorders. Hyperfunction of the ascending activating system of the brain seems to be responsible for the above psychophysiological changes.