volatile substance abuse via inhalation: clinical and demographical findings

OBJECTIVE: Scientific BACKGROUND: Volatile substance addiction which is a type of psychoactive substance abuse is seen as an increasing public health problem. Pyramidal, cerebellar, brainstem and peripheral nervous system involvement and cognitive deficits as well as neuroradiological findings are reported in these cases. OBJECTIVES: In this study, clinical features and neuropsychiatric findings of substance abusers who had used volatile substances via inhalation were investigated and sociodemographical features along with association between duration of addiction and clinical features as well as neuropsychiatric findings were presented. METHODS: Cases and METHOD: Sociodemographic and clinical features as well as cognitive function tests of consecutive 25 cases who admitted Bakirkoy Psychiatry Hospital, Alcohol and Substance Addiction Treatment Center in order to quit substance addiction were included. In order to make a comparison for cognitive function tests, 20 controls (age range: 18-22 years) were included. RESULTS: RESULTS: Mean age of cases were 16.9 years, mean age at onset 13 years. Toluene was the predominantly abused substance. We observed pathological neurological findings in 14 subjects (56%), pathological findings included findings indicating pyramidal (16%), brainstem (8%) and peripheral nerve involvement (32%). Mean scores of standardized mini mental test were 26.8±5.15 among cases and 29.7±2.52 in control group (p<0.05). There was no temporal relationship ragarding neurological findings and neuropsychological tests. CONCLUSION: CONCLUSION: We may suggest that toluene is responsible for slowly progressive central and peripheral nervous system involvement even in short term addiction. Low price and miscellaneous types of volatile substances in our country increase the addiction rate especially in high risk groups. Although volatile substances are yet only a social problem, we think that neurological consequences will become an important problem in near future