NCJ Number
160657
Date Published
1994
Length
5 pages
Annotation
Some nutritionists have found that the physical problems of poor nutrition and allergies can lead to alcoholism; nutritional therapy can help reduce cravings for alcohol and help alcoholics beat their addiction.
Abstract
The 12-year-old, holistically oriented Health Recovery Center (HRC), which claims a 74-percent success rate in treating alcoholics (patients still sober 1 year later), differs from conventional programs in several significant ways. First, it focuses on identifying and treating physiological imbalances that may be causing alcohol cravings. Perhaps the most dramatic way the HRC program differs from more conventional programs is in its concern with the effects that food allergies and chemical sensitivities can have on alcoholics. All HRC patients are sent to a clinical ecologist for extensive food allergy testing, and all problem foods are removed from their diets. They are also tested for sensitivities to chemicals, particularly ethanol, the fumes from which can intoxicate a susceptible individual, making him/her desperate for the real thing. Nutritional therapy has its critics, however. Michael Stoil, director of operations for the Washington (D.C.) Area Council on Alcoholism and Drug Abuse, for example, believes sugar addiction is a myth and believes the only connection between nicotine and alcohol is a social one. Still, there is no denying that to many HRC graduates, for whom conventional treatment had failed, the nutrition-oriented program was effective.