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BBC Horizon: "Do I Drink Too Much"
BBC Horizon "Do I Drink Too Much"
Broadcast: BBC HD, 9:00pm Friday 16th October 2009.
Presenter Dr John Marsden, Senior Lecturer in Addictive Behaviour at the Institute of Psychiatry, King's College London
Synopsis
Alcohol is by far the most widely used drug - and a dangerous one at that. So why are so many of us drinking over the recommended limits?
Why does alcohol have such a powerful grip on us? How much of our relationship with this drug is written in our genes? What are the real dangers of our children drinking too young?
Addiction expert John Marsden, who likes a drink, makes a professional and personal exploration of our relationship with alcohol. He undergoes physical and neurological examinations to determine its impact, and finds out why some people will find it much harder than others to resist alcohol. Even at the age of 14 there may be a way of determining which healthy children will turn into addicts.
John experiments with a designer drug being developed that hopes to replicate all the benefits of alcohol without the dangers. Could this drug replace alcohol in the future?
Problem:
A forty minute documentary on Addiction involving brain scans, reward deficiency and genes - with no mention of ADHD whatsoever. Significant numbers of scientific research studies now show that around 50%-70% of people with serious addictions are ADHD. I wrote to Dr Marsden at Kings College London, a professed expert in addiction, yet received no reply:
Dear Dr John Marsden,
I have just watched your interesting documentary on alcohol - Horizon "Do I drink too much?". You made many helpful and interesting points.
I was however somewhat surprised not to hear any mention of ADHD at all? You showed brain scans showing reward responses, discussed people favouring immediate reward over delayed and looked at genetic predispositions, yet gave no mention as to how ADHD affects dopamine levels and hence gives a much higher pre-disposition to addiction?
There is a very substantial body of evidence that shows the same genetic alleles are affected in addicts and in people with ADHD. See http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15063998 for example. Addiction is considered a high co-morbidity of ADHD in pretty much all studies. In fact some clinics such as Florida Detox Clinic www.floridadetox.com, see ADHD as the norm for addicts: "At Florida Detox, our clinical research demonstrates that over 70 percent of our addicted patients suffer from undiagnosed/untreated Attention Deficit Disorder". If you visit any AA meeting it is pretty obvious that the majority of sharers have undiagnosed ADHD.
In the UK we have a shockingly poor track record in accepting, recognising and helping people with ADHD. It seems a shame that an opportunity was missed in your documentary to highlight the connection between addiction and ADHD. I would be very happy to provide you with more information if you are interested in understanding the links.
Regards
Andrew Lewis
ADHD Coach