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  • Title: Acute effect of methadone maintenance dose on brain FMRI response to heroin-related cues.
    Author: Langleben DD, Ruparel K, Elman I, Busch-Winokur S, Pratiwadi R, Loughead J, O'Brien CP, Childress AR.
    Journal: Am J Psychiatry; 2008 Mar; 165(3):390-4. PubMed ID: 18056224.
    Abstract:
    OBJECTIVE: Environmental drug-related cues have been implicated as a cause of illicit heroin use during methadone maintenance treatment of heroin dependence. The authors sought to identify the functional neuroanatomy of the brain response to visual heroin-related stimuli in methadone maintenance patients. METHOD: Event-related functional magnetic resonance imaging was used to compare brain responses to heroin-related stimuli and matched neutral stimuli in 25 patients in methadone maintenance treatment. Patients were studied before and after administration of their regular daily methadone dose. RESULTS: The heightened responses to heroin-related stimuli in the insula, amygdala, and hippocampal complex, but not the orbitofrontal and ventral anterior cingulate cortices, were acutely reduced after administration of the daily methadone dose. CONCLUSIONS: The medial prefrontal cortex and the extended limbic system in methadone maintenance patients with a history of heroin dependence remains responsive to salient drug cues, which suggests a continued vulnerability to relapse. Vulnerability may be highest at the end of the 24-hour interdose interval.
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