Dr.
Karam-Hage is an assistant professor of psychiatry at the
University of Michigan Medical School. He is Medical Director
and Director of Medical Education of Chelsea Arbor Treatment
Center, a joint venture of the University of Michigan Health
System and Chelsea Community Hospital for treating people
with alcohol and other drug problems. Dr. Karam-Hage speaks 4 languages
(Arabic, French, Spanish and English). Graduated from the
University of Michigan's psychiatry residency program in 1998
and did two years of clinical/research fellowship in addiction
psychiatry with the guidance of Dr. Kirk Brower. Dr. Karam-Hage
is the recipient of the American College of Neuropsychopharmacology
(ACNP) research fellowship award of 1998. He does have strong
interest in pharmacotherapy trials for the treatment and prevention
of relapse to addiction. He is interested in early recovery
and mechanisms for relapse prevention. His research includes
studies to assess the treatment implications of alcohol-associated
sleep abnormalities; pharmacotherapy trials for alcoholism
with comorbid nicotine dependence or comorbid psychiatric
disorders. He has worked also on treatment outcome studies,
as well as on cravings for alcohol and its correlates with
brain imaging studies.
Dr. Karam-Hage is focusing his
research on the benefits from smoking cessation on the early
recovery from alcohol (between one month and 12 months of
sobriety). Knowing that smoking is still a common problem
with devastating consequences to the general population and
in particular to alcohol-dependent patients since it is of
higher prevalence (70-80% of alcoholics are smokers) . During
the last 10 years, published prospective trials have linked
quitting (vs. smoking) cigarettes to reduced relapse rates
in treated alcoholic and other patients with substance use
disorders. Existing data correlate smoking with both higher
cravings for alcohol/other substances and relapse. Smoking
in addition to alcohol seems to cause not only additional
health problems but multiplicative and in some cases exponential
increase in risk for disease. Alcoholics are known to be heavy
smokers and alcoholic smokers seem to have greater severity
of alcohol dependence than ex- or never-smokers. If smoking
cessation proves to be successful in reducing relapse rates
to alcohol, then a prevalent subset of alcoholics-smokers
may personally benefit and costs to society may decrease.
