An experiment to see if alcoholic liver damage can be repaired by treatment in a hyperbaric chamber - more commonly used for divers with the bends - starts next month.
The possibilities surrounding hyperbaric oxygen therapy (HBOT),
which is used in Russia to help to speed alcoholic detoxification, come at a time when Scotland faces increasingly gloomy figures over its alcohol problem. Yesterday it was revealed that the Scots are the eighth heaviest drinkers in the world.
Now patients from Castle Craig Hospital, a private detoxification centre near Peebles, are to participate in a pilot study run by doctors from the University of Edinburgh, which will seek to establish whether stem cells are mobilised by HBOT and if there is a corresponding improvement in liver function.
Research in Russia, where hyperbaric chambers have been employed for 15 years to treat people with alcohol problems, has shown that their use cuts in half the time needed for alcohol detoxification.
This will be the first time HBOT has been trialled for the treatment of alcohol-related illness in Britain.
Currently, the only "curative" treatment for cirrhosis of the liver is transplantation but due to donor shortages this is not available to most patients. There is also continuing controversy about providing patients who are addicted to alcohol with new livers.
The study has gained ethical approval and will focus on 20 volunteers from inpatients at Castle Craig, one of the UK's largest addiction centres, where an 18-seater hyperbaric chamber has been built, costing £250,000.
Participants will have a total of 20 sessions of two hours of hyperbaric oxygen, with blood samples taken from them during the course of treatment.
Koen Terra, 37, a patient at Castle Craig since October, said yesterday he had already had about 20 sessions in the hyperbaric chamber and was pleased to take part in the experiment.
"In the beginning, in the chamber, you get a rest in your whole body," he said. Mr Terra, 37, a chef from Amsterdam who has battled alcohol problems for 20 years, said he had a longstanding wound on his leg which had refused to heal. After sessions in the chamber, it was now getting better.
"It seems to be promoting healing in your whole body," he said. He said that during the sessions in the chamber, he wore a mask and would read a book or watch TV. "It is just like being in a pressurised airplane."
Peter Hayes, Professor of Hepatology at Edinburgh Royal Infirmary who is leading the trial, said: "Most ways of increasing stem cells are very complicated. The beauty of this approach is its simplicity. We have to do the study first before getting carried away."
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