The alcoholism-treatment drug acamprosate, widely used in Europe, may alleviate post-withdrawal sleep disturbances, say French researchers.

“During chronic and excessive use of alcohol, short periods of deep sleep become interrupted by brief periods of restlessness,” says Luc Staner, director of the Sleep Laboratory of the Centre Hospitalier de Rouffach, in France.

“This may also be accompanied by sleep terrors, sleepwalking and exacerbation of loud snoring or sleep apnea. During the day, alcohol intake can exacerbate sleepiness, which disrupts performance and contributes to accidents even when an individual is not significantly intoxicated.”

The symptoms from a lack of sleep can lead some patients to resume drinking in an attempt to self-medicate their sleep problems, and it is most likely that these persistent post-withdrawal sleep complaints have been shown to predict relapse to alcoholism, according to Staner.

“Compared to the placebo, results indicate that acamprosate objectively improves sleep disturbances of alcohol-dependent patients who are trying to stop alcohol intake,” says Staner.

The findings are published in the September issue of Alcoholism: Clinical & Experimental Research.