At-risk drinking linked
with higher death rates
Newswise — Older men who drink as few as two drinks twice a week and
also have diseases that could be worsened by alcohol or cause
problems with medications taken while drinking alcohol have higher
death rates, as compared to men who either drink less or may drink
more but don’t have such comorbidities.
Examining data from a 1971–74
health survey and a follow-up survey in 1992, the researchers found
that older men who drank moderately or heavily and had accompanying
comorbidities that could be worsened by alcohol use such as gout or
ulcer disease, or who took medications that could interact
negatively with alcohol use, such as sedatives or pain medications,
had 20 percent higher mortality rates than other drinkers.
The longitudinal
study — the first to examine in a large population the
mortality risks inherent in alcohol use and comorbidity —
will be published in the May issue of the Journal of the
American Geriatrics Society. It is available now online
at
http://www.blackwell-synergy.com/toc/jgs/0/0.
Previous studies have found that
moderate drinking can reduce risks for vascular disease and death,
said Dr. Alison Moore, associate professor of geriatrics at the
David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA, and the study’s lead
researcher.
“None of these studies have
specifically looked at the interaction of alcohol use and conditions
or medications that may be unsafe with even moderate amounts of
alcohol use,” she said. “This study shows that while moderate
alcohol use may be fine for people who don’t have other conditions
that could be worsened by the use of alcohol, such alcohol use may
not be fine if you take common medications for sleep, or for
arthritis pain, or have depression, or have some gastrointestinal
condition.”
The researchers analyzed data from
the 1971–74 National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey I (NHANES
I) and the 1992 NHANES I Epidemiologic Follow-up Survey.
Participants included 4,691 adults aged 60 and older. Some 10
percent of the people from the first survey were at-risk drinkers —
that is, they had more than two drinks a couple of times a week and
they also had selected comorbidities. Eighteen percent of men and 5
percent of women were deemed at-risk drinkers.
The researchers found that 2,673
people (1,379 men and 1,294 women) from the initial survey had died
by the time of the follow-up survey approximately 20 years later. Of
those who abstained from drinking, 65 percent (76 percent of men and
60 percent of women) had died. Of the drinkers considered to be
not-at-risk, 62 percent had died (68 percent of men, 56 percent of
women), and of the drinkers considered to be at-risk, 70 percent had
died (77 percent of men, 49 percent of women).
In analyses including men and
women, at-risk drinkers had a 12 percent increased risk for death
and abstainers had an 8 percent increased risk for death as compared
to not-at-risk drinkers. In analyses done separately for men and
women, men at-risk drinkers had a 20 percent increased risk of death
as compared to not-at-risk drinkers, while abstainers had no
increase in risk for death. Among women, neither at-risk drinkers
nor abstainers had increased risks for death compared to not-at-risk
drinkers.
One reason for the gender
discrepancy may be that women simply don’t drink as much as men,
Moore said. Only 89 women in the sample were considered at-risk
drinkers, versus 336 men.
“So it’s possible we couldn’t see
any effect on death rates for women, because there were too few
at-risk drinking women,” she said.
The findings suggest that lower
drinking thresholds should be recommended for older adults with
specific but common comorbidities.
Other researchers in the study
include Lisa Giuli (who conducted this project while a second-year
medical student); Drs. Peifeng Hu, David Reuben, Gail Greendale and
Arun Karlamangla; professor Robert Gould; and Kefei Zhou.
The John A. Hartford
Foundation/American Federation for Aging Research Medical Student
Geriatric Scholars Program, the Paul B. Beeson Physician Faculty
Scholars in Aging Program, the Mentored Clinical Scientist Awards
from the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism, the
National Institute on Aging and the National Institute on Aging UCLA
Older Americans Independence Center, and the Resource Center for
Minority Aging Research funded the study.
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