Brain damage is a common of long-term, heavy alcohol consumption.At the recent study, the relationships between duration and lifetime quantity of drinking and the development of cognitive problems is unclear.Some of them have proposed that cognitive performance worsens in direct proportion to the severity and duration of alcoholism.

In this study we want to show that alcohol consumption for long period of time infected the brain and cause the cognitive impairments.

we exposed the 201 male patients under the ages 35-65 who treated at the Department of Alcoholism, Institute of Addicitons, Belgrade in period June 2006 - June 2007.We used the data collected from patients history of illness, psychiatry interviews, structural imaging techniques -computed tomography(CT)of brain and medical protocol including the criteria of alcohol dependency and late residual according the ICD-X.

Total 201 male patients with diagnosis of alcohol dependent and long-term and heavy alcohol consumption:

25(12,43%) have clearly reduced cortex and loss of brain volume(visibly on computed tomography);82(40,79 %) have deficits in problem-solving, short-term and working memory and visuospatial abilities;36 (17,91%) have personality and behavior impairments;25(12,43 %) have deficits in learning and planning abilities;15 (7,46 %) have alcoholic dementia;18 (8,95 %) –other persisting cognitive impairment(poor attention, global inadequacy).

The most prevalent alcohol-associated brain impairments affect visuospatial abilities and higher cognitive functioning. Heavy alcohol consumption may affect cognitive functioning and structural brain abnormalities but clear association has not been established yet.