31st International Medical Advisory Group Conference

Niagara-on-the-Lake, Ontario — October 19-21, 2003
 

The 31st International Medical Advisory Group (IMAG) Conference, held in Niagara-on-the-Lake, Ontario, was hosted by the Brewers of Canada and organized by the ABMRF. The conference offered presentations around three major themes — Alcohol and Cognition, Molecular Mechanisms of Craving, and Future Directions in Alcohol Research — and featured talks by a number of ABMRF grant recipients. The first IMAG conference was held in Montebello, Quebec in 1972, and since that time it has evolved into an annual exchange of information across a wide range of topics in alcohol research. Each year, hosting duties rotate between groups in Canada, Australia and New Zealand, the United States, and Europe and the United Kingdom.

The opening session on “Alcohol and Cognition” presented various research on how response to alcohol affects behavior. As mentioned in the overview by ABMRF Behavioral and Social Advisory Council member Dr. Robert O. Pihl of McGill University, alcohol response is a subjective and complex process that depends on many factors related to cognitive functioning, and the session presentations explored various aspects of this process. The first speaker, Dr. Anne-Marie Wall of York University, discussed alcohol expectancies — or beliefs — about the outcome of drinking, which are hypothesized to be predictors of drinking behavior. Her work focusing on the interaction between expectancies and environment among college student drinkers will potentially shed light on the development of drinking patterns in this group. Dr. Mark T. Fillmore of the University of Kentucky talked about his research on the concept of self-control as it relates to alcohol use and abuse. He described the impairment of various behavioral functions that can occur with alcohol use and the significance of control mechanisms in the development of drinking problems. Dr. Bruce D. Bartholow of the University of North Carolina then discussed a specific consequence of alcohol use on social cognitive processes, namely that of stereotype activation and inhibition. In the context of two studies, Dr. Bartholow showed evidence that alcohol use can impair control of stereotyping that could potentially lead to discriminatory behavior.

As the session continued, Dr. Patricia J. Conrod, currently of King’s College London and formerly of the University of British Columbia, gave some background on the development of interventions and prevention initiatives specifically targeted to individuals with different personality risk factors for alcohol abuse. Her research testing and evaluating these types of personality-matched programs for young people shows they can potentially reduce rates of problem drinking. In the session’s final talk, Dr. Craig Easdon of the Rotman Research Institute described his work using functional magnetic resonance imaging to evaluate the effects of alcohol consumption on learning and response inhibition. His results suggest that moderate drinking can affect the neural networks that are involved in associative learning, thus providing a neurophysiological basis for some cognitive behavioral effects of alcohol consumption. Notably, all speakers in this session were current or former ABMRF grant recipients.

The second topical session investigated “Molecular Mechanisms of Craving,” and also featured a full slate of speakers who have received ABMRF funding. Dr. George F. Koob of the Scripps Research Institute, a member of the ABMRF Medical Advisory Council, provided the session introduction which included a definition and description of craving as it relates to psychoactive substances in general and alcohol in particular. Dr. Kristen A. Anstrom of Wake Forest University then gave the opening talk, “Mesolimbic Coding of Alcohol-Related Behaviors,” which discussed efforts to understand how the dopamine system contributes to alcohol-seeking behavior. She showed data on electrophysiological activity of dopamine neurons in an animal model that sheds light on the neural mechanisms involved in response to alcohol. Next, Dr. F. Woodward Hopf of the University of California at San Francisco reported on his data showing how a cooperative action of dopamine D1 and D2 receptors in the nucleus accumbens might influence dopamine-dependent addictive behavior.

In his talk entitled “Neuroactive Steroids and Ethanol-Induced Decreases in Spatial Cognitive Processing,” Dr. Douglas B. Matthews of the University of Memphis discussed how the interaction between the neuroactive steroid allopregnanolone and the hippocampal region could affect craving for alcohol. Moreover, Dr. Matthews demonstrated that this interaction is central to the cognitive affects of alcohol. The next speaker, Dr. R. Dayne Mayfield of the University of Texas, described interactions between alcohol and dopamine transporter function. His findings included evidence that alcohol consumption affects a variety of dopamine transporter mechanisms and in turn, that alterations in dopamine transporter activity could lead to alcohol effects, such as tolerance and withdrawal. The final presentation of the session, which concerned the interaction between alcohol and the NMDA receptor system, was given by Dr. Dorit Ron of the University of California at San Francisco. Dr. Ron discussed how alcohol’s actions on NMDA receptor function can influence states such as alcohol craving, and how her research aims to identify proteins involved in the signaling pathways of NMDA receptor subunits.

After ABMRF President Dr. Mack C. Mitchell, Jr. introduced the third topical session, “Future Directions in Alcohol Research,” US National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA) director Dr. Ting-Kai Li presented an overview of NIAAA activities and plans. Dr. Li, a former ABMRF Trustee and Medical Advisory Council Chairman, discussed the Institute’s updated mission and vision, as well as some of the basic questions that are in the process of being answered by its research agenda. He concluded with a description of future challenges and the initiatives that the NIAAA will use to face them. Next, Dr. Richard Brière spoke about government sponsored alcohol research in Canada, as the assistant director of the Institute of Neurosciences, Mental Health and Addiction (INMHA) of the Canadian Institute of Health Research. Dr. Brière’s presentation focused on the structure and aim of the relatively new INMHA, then described a recent forum that was convened to identify the most significant substance abuse research themes. Both Dr. Li and Dr. Brière stressed the significance of prioritizing the complex issues facing their agencies, and expressed hope that new knowledge would come out of multidisciplinary partnerships.

The following two presentations were given by Dr. Jeffrey W. Runge, administrator of the US National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, and Dr. Brian A. Jonah, director of road safety at Transport Canada. Each speaker discussed the issues central to traffic safety in their respective country, particularly that of drinking and driving, as well as the improvements that have been achieved. Both also stressed the need for continued research to address the far-reaching parameters of road safety— including epidemiological, legal, educational and treatment-oriented concerns — and discussed some of the initiatives being explored that address the specific problem of impaired driving. During the talks, it was mentioned that the theme of World Health Day 2004 is traffic safety, which put into perspective the international significance of the issue, as well as the need for wide-ranging discussion in this area.

The mention of international dialogue was a fitting lead into the final conference talk, “International Gender and Alcohol Research: Moving the Field Forward Through Collaboration,” by Dr. Sharon C. Wilsnack of the University of North Dakota and Dr. Louise Nadeau of the University of Montreal. Drs. Wilsnack and Nadeau, both members of the ABMRF Board of Trustees, began by describing the development of the International Research Group on Gender and Alcohol (IRGGA), which then led to the creation of GENACIS, or Gender, Alcohol and Culture: An International Study. While IRGGA focused on retrospective and comparative analyses of existing population surveys, GENACIS evolved as a new multinational endeavor whereby individual projects in numerous countries use standardized instruments to gather data on drinking patterns, behavior, consequences, and co-existing disorders, which will allow for important cross-cultural analyses. This presentation highlighted a significant and timely theme running throughout the IMAG conference, namely that the greatest challenges in the alcohol research arena will be met most effectively by collaborative efforts that address the complexities of the issues at hand.

Every other year, when the IMAG conference is held in North America, a special named lectureship is presented in honor of the ABMRF’s first legal advisor. This year, the H. Thomas Austern Memorial Lecture was originally to be given by Senator Michael J. L. Kirby, member of the Senate of Canada and chairman of the Senate Social Affairs, Science and Technology Committee. However, Senator Kirby was unable to attend, and instead, Dr. Richard Jessor, professor of psychology at the University of Colorado and member of the ABMRF Board of Trustees, shared some of his experiences as an accomplished mountain climber. He showed slides and discussed his recent climb of several peaks near Mount Everest in Tibet. Ultimately, Dr. Jessor’s presentation echoed some of the same ideas as the IMAG’s scientific sessions, and showed the value of cooperation and perseverance when meeting formidable challenges.

[Note: At the 27th Annual Scientific Meeting of the Research Society on Alcoholism (RSA), a symposium was held entitled “Dopamine Revisited: If It Were Simple, Wouldn’t We Have Figured It Out By Now?” The symposium featured four talks by speakers who had participated in the IMAG session on “Molecular Mechanisms of Craving,” and was presented in recognition of the ABMRF and their support of junior and newly established investigators. The RSA meeting was held from June 26-30, 2004 in Vancouver, British Columbia.]