Psychotherapy for alcohol use disorder extends benefit to alcohol-related liver disease

Undergoing psychotherapy for alcohol use disorder (AUD) helps prevent the incidence and progression of alcohol-associated liver disease (ALD), according to a study.

The study included 9,635 patients with AUD from the Mass General Brigham Biobank, with the mean follow-up from AUD diagnosis being 9.2 years. Researchers applied Cox regression models to generate hazard ratios (HR) for the development of ALD in relation to the receipt vs nonreceipt of psychotherapy, with adjustments for a range of other potential confounders.

The median age of the study population was 57 years, and 60.4 percent of them were male while 83.5 percent were White. In total, 3,544 patients (36.8 percent) received psychotherapy, and ALD occurred in 1,135 patients (11.8 percent).

Multivariable analysis revealed psychotherapy to be associated with a protective effect on the risk of ALD (HR, 0.59, 95 percent confidence interval [CI], 0.50–0.71; p<0.001). This association was observed for both individual psychotherapy (HR, 0.70, 95 percent CI, 0.56–0.86; p<0.001) and group psychotherapy (HR, 0.76, 95 percent CI, 0.61–0.94; p=0.01).

In the group of patients with cirrhosis, psychotherapy was associated with a lower frequency of hepatic decompensation (HR, 0.68, 95 percent CI, 0.44–0.95; p=0.03).

The findings underscore the potential of psychotherapy in improving outcomes for patients with AUD.