CDT Levels A Thought

[DC905210]

I think I may have thought while the "CDT Levels to Return to Normal" opinions seem to vary so wildly.

The DVLA limits of <2.3% is OK seem very generous.

A lot of sources I see that are more concerned with monitoring abstenence consider <1.6% or even lower "a failure" and the way half lives work in chemistry the lower the value you are aiming to acheive the longer it takes almost exponentially. Stay you start with a value of 4 and two weeks later it HALVES to 2 it will then take another two weeks to half to 1. The relationship is not linear.

 

[Drongo]

There is also the variability of the half life of CDT. It seems to be generally regarded as 17 days +/- 4 days.

So person A could go through two half lives in 26 days, while person B could take 42 days to achieve the same decrease.

Extrapolate that out to three half lives to reduce CDT level from say 5% > 2.5% > 1.25% and the differential becomes 24 days; ranging from a low of 39 days to a high of 63 days
By the next half life the difference is heading toward being doubled, from 52 to 84 days! (7 1/2 weeks to 12 weeks)

I suspect that this is the reason why some take longer than others to achieve similar outcomes, along with potentially assuming the starting CDT level is lower than it actually is.

 

[shouldaknownbetter]

I think I may have thought while the "CDT Levels to Return to Normal" opinions seem to vary so wildly.

The DVLA limits of <2.3% is OK seem very generous.

A lot of sources I see that are more concerned with monitoring abstenence consider <1.6% or even lower "a failure" and the way half lives work in chemistry the lower the value you are aiming to acheive the longer it takes almost exponentially. Stay you start with a value of 4 and two weeks later it HALVES to 2 it will then take another two weeks to half to 1. The relationship is not linear.

I believe that most of us who have commented on reducing CDT have described it as exponential decay, essentially the definition of half-life. Some posters have insisted that a set amount of time will produce the same result in everyone but this clearly wouldn't be the case.
I have also seen studies where they are looking for a much lower CDT level but these are often studies being conducted amongst chronic alcoholic patients who have submitted to residential rehab programs.