Third stage of alcoholism

Duration 5-10 years.

All manifestations of the third stage - pathological attraction to alcohol, loss of quantitative control, withdrawal syndrome, alcoholic amnesia - undergo further development and are manifested in the form of the most severe clinical variants.

Intensive attraction is also manifested in the loss of situational control (there is no criticism of the place, circumstances, the company of drinking companions), which is facilitated by the loss of intellectual abilities that has come.

The main sign of the transition of alcoholism to the third stage is a decrease in tolerance to alcohol, the patient gets drunk from smaller, than usual, doses of alcohol. Activating effects of alcoholic beverages are reduced, they only moderately level the tone, almost every alcoholic intoxication ends with amnesia.

Physical dependence and irresistible attraction determine the life of the patient; The lack of quantitative control in combination with decreased tolerability often leads to fatal overdoses.