Case study Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words - 18

Case study - Essay Example These areas are responsible for feeling and expressing your emotions, releasing hormones in stress conditions, for communication inside the brain and for the learning and memory purposes. Brain cells that are neurons use chemicals named neurotransmitters and these are responsible for communication in brain. Alcohol can cause a change in the activities of neurotransmitters and an imbalance takes place in their actions which inturn will result in seizures, sedation, depression, agitation and other disorders related to mood and behaviour. In 2003, Aaron M. White found that alcohol interferes with the brain ability to make new long term memories and for the ability to keep the fresh information active for limited period of time. Alcohol consumption in this case leads to memory impairment and as a consequence partial or complete blackouts occur. The end result will be periods of memory loss while drinking. Martin, Singleton & Hiller (2003) described Thiamine, also termed as Vitamin B1 to be one of the essential nutrients required by tissues of the body including brain. The enzymes that use thiamine need to function effectively or otherwise they will result affecting the neurotransmitters in the brain. The brain requires thiamine for its nerve cells (neurons); other cells in the nervous system also rely on thiamine. Thiamine deficiency makes the work of these enzymes slow considerably. As they are harmful for the brain cells, the most severe outcome can be in the form of brain damage. In 2008, Harrigan, Maguire & Laszlo Boros suggested that alcohol consuming patients are mostly found to report very low level of thiamine in their blood which mostly results in neuro-degeneration. This degeneration is linked with the brain area called cerebellum. Cerebellum is directly connected with alcohol addiction as alcohol makes a direct impact on it. But thiamine deficiency is found to place much more impact on cerebellum than alcohol can. 3.