Quality of life and pain perception in alcohol dependence: A comparative examination of patients, their relatives, and healthy controls

Abstract

Objective: The aim of this study was to investigate how quality of life and the perception of pain are affected by patients with alcohol dependence and their relatives compared with healthy controls. Methods: Fifty patients with alcohol dependence, 50 first-degree relatives of patients with alcohol dependence, and 50 healthy controls were included. Participants were evaluated with a questionnaire form of sociodemographic characteristics, and the World Health Organization Quality of Life-Bref-Turkish form (WHOQOL-BREF-TR). They were then given a noxious stimulus using a transcutaneous electrical nerve stimulation (TENS) device. After that, pain threshold, pain tolerance, and visual analog scale (VAS) scores of the participants were measured. Results: Patients' quality of life was poorer than the relative and control groups. The age of first alcohol use was found to be positively associated with quality of life. Pain tolerance was found to be higher in the patients than in the controls. We found no relationship between pain perception and characteristics of addiction. Conclusions: In this study, pain tolerance was found to be higher in patients with alcohol dependence, and the characteristics of addiction did not seem to affect pain perception.