Cortical stimulation of the prefrontal cortex with transcranial direct current stimulation reduces cue-provoked smoking craving: a randomized, sham-controlled study.

Publication Type:

Journal Article

Authors:

Fregni, Felipe; Liguori, Paola; Shirley Fecteau; Nitsche, Michael A; Pascual-Leone, Alvaro; Boggio, Paulo S

Source:

J Clin Psychiatry, Volume 69, Issue 1, p.32-40 (2008)

Keywords:

Adolescent, Adult, Affect, Cross-Over Studies, Cues, Double-Blind Method, Electric Stimulation, Electric Stimulation Therapy, Female, Headache, Humans, Male, Middle Aged, Placebos, Prefrontal Cortex, Pruritus, Smoking, Smoking Cessation

Abstract:

OBJECTIVE: Because neuroimaging studies have shown that cue-provoked smoking craving is associated with changes in the activity of the bilateral dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC), we aimed to investigate whether a powerful technique of noninvasive brain stimulation, transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS), reduces cue-provoked smoking craving as indexed by a visual analog scale.METHOD: We performed a randomized, sham-controlled crossover study in which 24 subjects received sham and active tDCS (anodal tDCS of the left and right DLPFC) in a randomized order. Craving was induced by cigarette manipulation and exposure to a smoking video. The study ran from January 2006 to October 2006.RESULTS: Smoking craving was significantly increased after exposure to smoking-craving cues (p < .0001). Stimulation of both left and right DLPFC with active, but not sham, tDCS reduced craving significantly when comparing craving at baseline and after stimulation, without (p = .007) and with (p = .005) smoking-craving cues. There were no significant mood changes in any of the conditions of stimulation. Adverse events were mild and distributed equally across all treatment conditions.CONCLUSIONS: Our findings extend the results of a previous study on the use of brain stimulation to reduce craving, showing that cortical stimulation with tDCS is beneficial for reducing cue-provoked craving, and thus support the further exploration of this technique for smoking cessation.