Young to middle-aged women who drink eight or more alcoholic drinks a week – more than one a day, on average – face a significantly increased risk of coronary heart disease (or ischemic heart disease) compared to their peers who drink less.
This is shown in a new large study that will be presented at the Annual Scientific Meeting of the American College of Cardiology, which will take place in Atlanta, USA, from April 6 to 8.
As it emerged from the study, the risk of heart disease reached its “zenith” in both men and women who reported heavy episodic alcohol consumption (binge drinking, i.e. consuming a large amount of alcohol not on a constant basis but occasionally).
A surprising find for young women
The study focused on adults aged 18 to 65 and is one of the largest and most comprehensive studies conducted to date on the link between alcohol and heart disease.
“For occasional drinkers, both men and women who drank heavily had a higher risk of heart disease.” said the Jamal Ranacardiologist, researcher at the Kaiser Permanente Northern California Division of Research, lead author of the new study, and added: “For women, we found a consistently increased risk from drinking, even when they were not heavy episodic drinkers. We did not expect these results in younger women as we typically see an increased risk of heart disease in older women. This finding really surprised us.”
The study
The researchers analyzed data on more than 430,000 people (nearly 243,000 men and 189,000 women) who received care at the Kaiser Permanente health organization in Northern California. The average age of the participants was 44 years, and none had heart disease at the start of the study.
Information on each participant’s alcohol consumption was collected during primary health care visits in 2014-2015 and follow-up for a possible diagnosis of coronary heart disease covered the following four years.
Coronary artery disease is caused by a narrowing of the arteries that supply blood to the heart, resulting in reduced blood flow and can cause chest pain and acute episodes, such as cardiac arrest.
Low, moderate and high alcohol consumption
Alcohol consumption was categorized as low (one to two drinks per week for both men and women), moderate (three to 14 drinks per week for men and three to seven drinks per week for women), or high (15 or more drinks per week for men and eight or more drinks per week for women). A separate categorization was also made for each volunteer regarding whether they had episodic alcohol consumption or not.
The definition of episodic consumption
Episodic drinking was defined as drinking more than four drinks for men or more than three drinks for women in a single day within the previous three months. The researchers took into account known cardiovascular risk factors such as age, physical activity, smoking and others in their analysis.
In total, 3,108 participants were diagnosed with coronary heart disease during the four-year follow-up period – the incidence of ischemic heart disease appeared to increase as alcohol consumption increased.
Risk ‘spiking’ in women who drank very occasionally
As it turned out, among women who had no history of episodic drinking, those who reported high total drinking faced a 45% higher risk of heart disease compared to those who drank moderately. Women with moderate drinking had a 29% higher risk of heart disease than those who reported low drinking. The risk “spiked” in women who were occasional drinkers – women in this category were 68% more likely to develop coronary heart disease compared to moderate drinkers. For men, heavy drinkers were 22% more likely to develop heart disease than moderate drinkers.
Young women are also vulnerable
“Women feel protected from heart disease at young ages, yet this study shows that even in young or middle age, heavy or episodic drinking increases the risk of coronary heart disease.” noted Dr. Rana.
The findings showed no significant difference in the risk of heart disease between moderate or low drinkers – regardless of whether they were episodic drinkers or not.
Increased blood pressure and metabolic changes
Alcohol has been shown to increase blood pressure and lead to metabolic changes associated with inflammation and obesity. At the same time, women metabolize alcohol differently than men. According to the researchers, the new results should draw attention to the serious health risks posed by heavy alcohol consumption while highlighting the need to include alcohol consumption in heart disease risk assessment as well as heart disease prevention strategies.
The reality might be worse…
It should be emphasized at this point that one of the limitations of the study was that as far as the participants’ alcohol consumption was concerned, it was based on their self-reports. But given that most people tend not to be honest about how much alcohol they consume when asked by a health professional, the new study may ultimately provide … conservative estimates of the link between alcohol and heart disease. In general, the reality is probably even worse…
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