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Neurological Disease
Published in John S. Axford, Chris A. O'Callaghan, Medicine for Finals and Beyond, 2023
Blackouts are transient attacks of loss of consciousness during attacks. Dizziness can mean light-headedness, or vertigo, or a general feeling of unsteadiness. Labyrinthine disorders cause only vertigo, nausea and nystagmus.Brainstem lesions cause diplopia, dysarthria, dysphagia, blurred vision, quadriparesis or cranial nerve palsies in addition to vertigo.Cerebellar lesions may cause unsteadiness, imbalance or ‘walking as if drunk’, but not vertigo.Presyncope comprises light-headedness, faintness, sweating and pallor, which may be relieved by lying flat.Complex partial seizures may be accompanied by déjà vu, altered smell and/or taste, and vivid memories. Stereotyped movements (e.g. lip smacking), automatisms and an open-eyed trance-like state last a few minutes.Absence seizures may be accompanied by fluttering of the eyelids.
Emergencies in Drug and Alcohol Use and Their Management
Published in Frank Lynn Iber, Alcohol and Drug Abuse as Encountered in Office Practice, 2020
Blackouts, most common in long-standing alcoholism, are periods of amnesia. A witness will be unaware that the patient is in any way unusual, but a short or substantial period of recent memory is erased. During this time the patient may have traveled some distance or transacted business, but may not know the outcome of an important issue occurring during that time. Physicians are often consulted urgently about these. Blackouts require no treatment, occur in half of all alcoholics, and disappear when the drinking ceases, but that may require several years. A close association of blackouts with loss of short-term memory has been noted.4
Neurology
Published in Paul Bentley, Ben Lovell, Memorizing Medicine, 2019
Causes of blackouts can be broken down logically into: Insufficient cerebral flow (syncope)Disorder of blood composition or metabolites (systemic)Primary neurological
Bodies in lockdown: Young women’s narratives of falling severely ill with ME/CFS during childhood and adolescence
Published in Health Care for Women International, 2023
Silje Helen Krabbe, Anne Marit Mengshoel, Wenche Schrøder Bjorbækmo, Unni Sveen, Karen Synne Groven
Elisabeth provided a powerful description of how her body stopped functioning: It took a while before my body fell apart… but I just got more exhausted… in time my body just stopped, as if “it’s enough”. As if I had hit a wall… I got a period of “blackout” and slept for 24 hours in a dark room. Lost my appetite, lost weight, the need to go to the bathroom… I lost it all… and could not do anything about it… just constantly exhausted. The “blackout” came without warning and that was the worst part. All of a sudden, nothing “firing” in my body – you are not thinking or dreaming… just “Boom!” … As if the body were shutting down… Elisabeth describes how she hit the wall and experienced terrifying episodes of “blackout”. Losing her appetite along with the need to go to the toilet, she seemed to enter another state of existence. In her description, she likens her body to a machine: one which falls apart, fails to fire up, or simply shuts down (“boom”). This “blackout” can be compared to a kind of bodily “lockdown”.
Past year high-intensity drinking moderates the association between simultaneous alcohol and marijuana use and blackout frequency among college students
Published in Journal of American College Health, 2023
Christal N. Davis, Genevieve F. Dash, Mary Beth Miller, Wendy S. Slutske
As would be expected, level of alcohol consumption is one important predictor of blackout, with heavy alcohol consumption often preceding these experiences.11,12 An extreme form of binge drinking, known as high-intensity drinking (HID; i.e., drinking at least twice the binge threshold of 4+/5+ drinks for women/men, respectively), is particularly associated with risk for experiencing acute physiological consequences of alcohol use, including blackouts.13 While twice the binge threshold is the typical cutoff for HID, some studies have explored the possible utility of an additional HID-3 cutoff (i.e., drinking at least three times the binge threshold).13–17 The distinction between HID-2 and HID-3 may be particularly useful for more severe alcohol-related consequences like blackout. For example, in one study of adult Australians, individuals who drank to HID-3 levels were significantly more likely to report blackouts compared to those who drank to HID-2 levels.13
Gender, acculturation, and alcohol-related consequences among college students of color
Published in Journal of American College Health, 2023
Chan Jeong Park, Lindsey K. Freeman, Nicole A. Hall, Samyukta Singh, Kate B. Carey, Jennifer E. Merrill, Angelo M. DiBello, Mary Beth Miller
Past literature on acculturation and drinking has focused primarily on variations in drinking quantity and frequency, as opposed to alcohol-related consequences. For instance, the majority of studies included in a quantitative review of Latinx acculturation and alcohol use employed drinking quantity and frequency as measures of alcohol use,29 with fewer examining drinking consequences or specific drinking problems such as blackouts. Because persons of color may be more likely than non-Hispanic whites to suffer consequences as a result of alcohol use, even when drinking at lower levels,11 research focused specifically on alcohol-related problems in this population is important. We posit that blackouts are an especially important consequence to consider, as they are commonly reported among college students and indicate neurocognitive impairment as a result of alcohol use.32