The cognitive impairments and psychological wellbeing of methamphetamine dependent patients compared with health controls.

Abstract Background and aims Chronic methamphetamine (MA) use is associated with cognitive impairment and psychopathological symptoms. This longitudinal study aims to examine the cognitive function of MA addicts during periods of abstinence. Methods Fifty-four MA dependent individuals and 58 healthy controls (HC) completed the psychological wellbeing scales and the CogState Battery that evaluated seven cognitive domains. During approximately 6-month abstinence, the subjects completed the CogState battery twice at the interval of 3 months. Results In the tasks of verbal memory, social emotional cognition, and spatial working memory, working memory, and problem solving the MA group performed worse than the HC group (P  t  = 3.13, P = 0.002) and quality of life ( t  = 3.70, P  Conclusions Chronic MA addicts exhibited impairment of some CogState battery domains and poor psychological wellbeing, and that some of these subdomains were recoverable on abstinence. Therefore, improved cognitive function should be considered an important component in the treatment of MA dependence.