2 Saxfield Drive, Baguley Hall, Manchester M23 1PY, UK
Received 18 November 2002; accepted 2 January 2003
With regard to the article entitled as above by Umhau et al.(2002), may I make the following comments. This important article helps to dispel the myth about alcoholics consuming sweet food as a compensatory mechanism. The subjects included in the study are said to have at least 6 months sobriety without any indication of a range or upper duration. It is difficult to accept this as long-term abstinence.
Is it not time to set a standard for long-term studies in the field of alcoholism to equate with other illnesses such as 5- and 10-year recovery for cancer. Both researchers and editors in the field of alcoholism should now accept 5 years to be the minimum, not the mean or average, criterion for the duration of long-term sobriety and recovery. This would still allow for short-term or intermediate-term to be additionally defined.
REFERENCES
Umhau, J. C., Petrulis, S. G., Diaz, R., Riggs, P. A., Biddison, J. R. and George, D. T. (2002) Long-term abstinent alcoholics have a blunted blood glucose response to 2-deoxy-D-glucose. Alcohol and Alcoholism 37, 586590.