Importance of the field: Alcohol abuse and dependence are major causes of morbidity and mortality and come with a high societal cost. The illness is notoriously difficult to treat and relapse is a common occurrence. Acamprosate represents an effective addition to the treatment options available for alcohol dependence with a novel mechanism of action.
Areas covered in this review: We review the published acamprosate literature focusing on major and recent comparative clinical trials and meta-analyses. We included all studies found in National Library of Medicine's PubMed database searching on Mesh term: acamprosate excluded animal studies excluding non-English publications, and focusing on efficacy/effectiveness studies. Additionally, we discuss background information on alcohol dependence and acamprosate's putative mechanism of action. Safety and tolerability data are also presented.
What the reader will gain: The reader will gain a better understanding of the role of acamprosate in the treatment of alcohol dependence and find a useful synopsis of the more recently published literature evaluating acamprosate's effectiveness based on what are not always identically defined primary study outcomes.
Take home message: Acamprosate is safe and effective in the maintenance of abstinence from alcohol use/abuse and is most commonly used in combination with nonpharmacologic therapeutic modalities. The effect size ranged from 1.3 to 2 for most of the studies included in this review.