{"doi":"10.3389/fpsyt.2022.931280","title":"An exploratory study of pro-inflammatory cytokines in individuals with alcohol use disorder: MCP-1 and IL-8 associated with alcohol consumption, sleep quality, anxiety, depression, and liver biomarkers","abstract":"Background High levels of sleep disturbances reported among individuals with alcohol use disorder (AUD) can stimulate inflammatory gene expression, and in turn, may alter pro-inflammatory cytokines levels. We aimed to investigate associations between pro-inflammatory cytokine markers with subjective measures of sleep quality, psychological variables and alcohol consumption among individuals with AUD. Methods This exploratory study is comprised of individuals with AUD ( n = 50) and healthy volunteers ( n = 14). Spearman correlation was used to investigate correlations between plasma cytokine levels and clinical variables of interest (liver and inflammatory markers, sleep quality, patient reported anxiety/depression scores, and presence of mood and/or anxiety disorders (DSM IV/5); and history of alcohol use variables. Results The AUD group was significantly older, with poorer sleep quality, higher anxiety/depression scores, and higher average drinks per day as compared to controls. Within the AUD group, IL-8 and MCP-1 had positive significant correlations with sleep, anxiety, depression and drinking variables. Specifically, higher levels of MCP-1 were associated with poorer sleep ( p = 0.004), higher scores of anxiety ( p = 0.006) and depression ( p < 0.001), and higher number of drinking days ( p = 0.002), average drinks per day ( p < 0.001), heavy drinking days ( p < 0.001) and total number of drinks ( p < 0.001). The multiple linear regression model for MCP-1 showed that after controlling for sleep status and heavy drinking days, older participants ( p = 0.003) with more drinks per day ( p = 0.016), and higher alkaline phosphatase level ( p = 0.001) had higher MCP-1 level. Conclusion This exploratory analysis revealed associations with cytokines MCP-1 and IL-8 and drinking consumption, sleep quality, and anxiety and depression in the AUD group. Furthermore, inflammatory and liver markers were highly correlated with certain pro-inflammatory cytokines in the AUD group suggesting a possible relationship between chronic alcohol use and inflammation. These associations may contribute to prolonged inflammatory responses and potentially higher risk of co-morbid chronic diseases.","journal":"Frontiers in Psychiatry","year":2022,"id":241290,"datarank":0.0,"base_score":0.0,"endowment":0.0,"self_citation_contribution":0.0,"citation_network_contribution":0.0,"self_endowment_contribution":0.0,"citer_contribution":0.0,"corpus_percentile":null,"corpus_rank":null,"citation_count":42,"citer_count":0,"citers_with_citation_signal":0,"citers_with_endowment":0,"datacite_reuse_total":0,"is_dataset":false,"is_dataset_confidence":0.9535,"is_data_producer":false,"deposit_databanks":null,"is_oa":true,"file_count":0,"downloads":0,"has_version_chain":false,"published_date":"2022-01-01","fair_score":null,"fair_percentile":null,"algorithm_id":"datarank_citation_only_1hop_v6","ranking_scope":"data_only","authors":[{"id":315142,"name":"Gwenyth R. Wallen","orcid":"0000-0001-7134-1636","position":1,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":369453,"name":"Li Yang","orcid":"0000-0002-4513-872X","position":2,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":870022,"name":"Jenna Alkhatib","orcid":"0000-0003-4377-0366","position":3,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":345453,"name":"Melanie L. Schwandt","orcid":"0000-0002-8355-4900","position":4,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":239662,"name":"Dechun Feng","orcid":"0000-0001-7485-762X","position":5,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":226858,"name":"Bin Gao","orcid":"0000-0002-0505-2972","position":6,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":315140,"name":"Nancy Diazgranados","orcid":"0000-0002-7415-8455","position":7,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":395967,"name":"Vijay A. Ramchandani","orcid":"0000-0003-2474-2183","position":8,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":315134,"name":"Jennifer J. Barb","orcid":"0000-0003-3022-0154","position":9,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":315138,"name":"Narjis Kazmi","orcid":"0000-0002-9847-4073","position":0,"is_corresponding":true}],"reference_count":61,"raw_metadata":null,"created_at":"2026-07-19T00:22:56.227656Z","pmid":"36032219","pmcid":null,"fwci":null,"citation_percentile":null,"influential_citations":0,"oa_status":null,"license":null,"views":0,"total_file_size_bytes":0,"version_count":0,"fair_f":null,"fair_a":null,"fair_i":null,"fair_r":null,"fair_zscore":null,"fair_rationale":null,"fair_model":null,"fair_agent_version":null,"fair_fulltext_source":null,"fair_has_llm":null,"fair_computed_at":null,"clinical_trials":[],"software_tools":[],"db_accessions":[],"linked_datasets":[],"topics":[]}