Heavy Episodic Drinking Greatly Increases Mortality Risk Among People with Low-Risk Alcohol Use
An association between heavy episodic drinking and adverse health outcomes has been demonstrated in epidemiologic studies for decades. This study evaluated total mortality among 446 people aged 55–65 with an average consumption of ≤½ drink in a day for women or ≤2 for men, comparing those with heavy episodic drinking* (N=74) with those without (N=372).
- Compared with subjects who engaged in heavy episodic drinking, those who did not were significantly higher in socio-economic status and were less likely to smoke, or have depressive symptoms or obesity.
- In analyses adjusted for potential confounders, subjects with heavy episodic drinking had more than 2 times higher odds of 20-year mortality than those without heavy episodic drinking.
* Defined as ≥4 drinks in an occasion for women and ≥5 for men.
Comments:
The results of this study support previous findings of an association between heavy episodic drinking and mortality. However, the study had some weaknesses: 1) there were relatively few participants with heavy episodic drinking in the analysis; and 2) there were no data on potential changes in drinking habits over 20 years. A key implication is that simply knowing a subject’s average consumption is inadequate for classification; details on patterns of drinking are crucial.
R. Curtis Ellison, MD
Reference:
Holahan CJ, Schutte KK, Brennan PL, et al. Episodic heavy drinking and 20-year total mortality among late-life moderate drinkers. Alcohol Clin Exp Res. 2014;38(5):1432–1438.