Alzheimer's, Dementia & Mental Health
Alcohol Consumption
by Elderly Reduces Risk of Dementia, Alzheimer’s
Most studies of
senior citizens in last 31 years show association between moderate
alcohol consumption and better cognitive function and reduced risk of
dementia
March
7, 2011 - The evidence is
growing more convincing – even for senior citizens aged 75 and older -
that alcohol consumption reduces the risk of dementia and Alzheimer’s
disease. A study released today found elderly drinkers had approximately
30% less overall dementia and 40% less Alzheimer dementia than did
non-drinking subjects. The report is online in Age and Ageing,
published by Oxford University Press for the British Geriatrics
Society.
These results
are similar to several previous studies in the very elderly and suggest
that moderate drinking is associated with less dementia, according to
the researchers.
Interestingly,
the study found no significant differences according to the type of
alcoholic beverage consumed.
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Alzheimer's, Dementia & Mental Health |
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The authors’
conclusions suggest, too, that light-to-moderate alcohol consumption is
inversely related to dementia, even among the elderly.
"The badge of
age is not a warning label of fragility,” said Harvey Finkel, MD,
Hematology/Oncology, Boston University Medical Center.
Finkel, a member
of the Forum that reviewed the research, added, “While, I believe, one
should not start to drink just because one has attained seniority,
neither must one stop! Elderly folks handle alcohol with more
responsibility than do the young, and they may derive greater health
benefits from moderate drinking. Age is not a reason for abstinence."
The Forum noted
that in the last 31 years (1980 – 2011) the association between moderate
alcohol intake and cognitive function has been investigated in 71
studies comprising 153,856 men and women from various populations with
various drinking patterns. Most studies showed an association between
light to moderate alcohol consumption and better cognitive function and
reduced risk of dementia, including vascular dementia and Alzheimer
dementia.
The Forum also
noted they considered the research “well done.”
This study
involved 3202 German individuals (age 75+) who were in the care of
general practitioners. Free of dementia, they were studied at baseline,
were followed up 1.5 years and 3 years later by means of structured
clinical interviews including detailed assessment of current alcohol
consumption and DSM-IV dementia diagnoses.
Associations
between alcohol consumption (in grams of ethanol), type of alcohol
(wine, beer, mixed alcohol beverages) and incident dementia were
examined.
There was good
ascertainment of the development of dementia, even among subjects who
died during follow up. Of 3,202 subjects free of dementia at baseline,
217 subjects met the criteria for dementia during follow up.
The study was
led by Dr. Siegfried Weyerer, Central Institute of Mental Health,
Mannheim, Germany. Other researchers from German institutions included
Martina Schäufele, Birgitt Wiese, Wolfgang Maier, Franziska Tebarth,
Hendrik van den Bussche, Michael Pentzek, Horst Bickel, Melanie Luppa,
and Steffi G. Riedel-Heller
Forum Comments
“Happy people
with many friends have the most opportunities for social drinking, and
in this study alcohol consumption was significantly associated with
factors that are protective for the development of dementia: better
education, not living alone, and absence of depression,“ noted Forum
member Erik Skovenborg, MD, Scandinavian Medical Alcohol Board,
Practitioner, Aarhus, Denmark.
“However, even
after controlling for these and several other factors, the risk for
incident dementia was still significantly lower among light-to-moderate
alcohol consumers. Even so it may still be a part of the explanation
that old German men and women, who drank alcohol sensibly in old age,
also have a healthier lifestyle in terms of physical, dietary, and
mental perspectives."
Forum member
Roger Corder, PhD, MRPharmS, William Harvey Research Institute, Queen
Mary University of London, UK, agreed, adding, "From all I have read on
this subject, I fully agree that it is very difficult to separate
alcohol consumption from other healthy lifestyle factors in populations
where moderate drinking is commonplace.
“In this
respect, the study doesn't correct for a healthy diet, which is also
likely very important, as a poor diet is associated with increased risk
of dementia due to deficiencies such as low omega-3 fat intake,
inadequate vitamin B12, etc. However, it is also known that improved
vascular function in alcohol drinkers could account for some element of
reduced dementia risk."
Other Forum
reviewers thought this was a well-performed study, with a result
supporting previous ones, but there were limitations to the study. It
included ex-drinkers with never drinkers in the referent group; there
was a rather short period of follow up; among subjects reporting "mixed"
types of beverage intake (that had the greatest estimated effect),
numbers of subjects according to the percentage of their total alcohol
intake from wine (e.g., < 30%, = 30%) were not given; there was no
evidence of a dose-response curve, probably due to small numbers; the
small numbers also probably made it impossible to assess for differences
in effect for Alzheimer dementia and for other dementias.
Reference:
Weyerer S, Schaufele M, Wiese B, Maier W, Tebarth F, van den Bussche H,
Pentzek M, Bickel H, Luppa M, Riedel-Heller SG, for the German AgeCoDe
Study Group (German Study on Ageing, Cognition and Dementia in Primary
Care Patients). Current alcohol consumption and its relationship to
incident dementia: results from a 3-year follow-up study among primary
care attenders aged 75 years and older.
Age and Ageing 2011; 0: 1
doi: 10.1093/ageing/afr007.
