A new study led by Massachusetts General Hospital researchers suggests that light-to-moderate alcohol consumption might reduce the risk of heart disease by lowering stress signaling in the brain.
This study is the first to report the long-term neurobiological effects of light-to-moderate drinking, specifically its potential to dampen activity in the brain’s stress systems.
The study is published in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology.
Details of the Study
The study involved more than 50,000 individuals enrolled in the Mass General Brigham Biobank.
The research examined the relationship between light/moderate alcohol consumption (defined as 1 drink per day for women and 1 to 2 drinks per day for men) and major adverse cardiovascular events, after adjusting for various factors such as genetics, lifestyle, clinical, and socioeconomic.
Findings: Reduced Stress Signals and Heart Disease Risk
The researchers found that light-to-moderate alcohol consumption was associated with a substantial reduction in the risk of cardiovascular disease events.
Moreover, brain imaging of a subset of 754 individuals indicated reduced stress signaling in the amygdala — a brain region associated with stress responses — in light-to-moderate drinkers, compared to those who abstained from alcohol or drank very little.
Senior author and cardiologist Ahmed Tawakol, MD, explained that when the amygdala is overly alert, the sympathetic nervous system gets heightened, resulting in increased blood pressure and heart rate.
If this stress is chronic, it leads to hypertension, inflammation, and a substantial risk of obesity, diabetes, and cardiovascular disease.
Notably, the study also found that light-to-moderate drinking was associated with almost double the cardiac-protective effect in individuals with a history of anxiety compared to others.
Caution on Alcohol Consumption and Future Research
Despite these findings, the researchers caution against the use of alcohol to reduce the risk of heart attacks or strokes due to alcohol’s other adverse health effects.
The study showed that any amount of alcohol increases the risk of cancer.
Moreover, high levels of alcohol consumption (more than 14 drinks a week) raised heart attack risk and diminished overall brain activity, which could have negative implications for cognitive health.
The researchers concluded that future studies should focus on finding new interventions that reduce the brain’s stress activity without the detrimental effects of alcohol.
Current studies are investigating the effects of exercise, stress-reduction interventions like meditation, and pharmacological therapies on stress-associated neural networks and their potential cardiovascular benefits.
If you care about heart failure, please read studies about diabetes drug that could revolutionize heart failure treatment, and this drug can be a low-cost heart failure treatment.
For more information about heart health, please see recent studies that exercise in middle age reversed worrisome heart failure, and results showing this drug combo can cut the risk of stroke and heart attack by half.
The study was published in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology.
Copyright © 2023 Knowridge Science Report. All rights reserved.
