Alcohol and sudden death: Devil's brew or Ambrosia of the Gods?

Alcohol and sudden death: Devil's brew or Ambrosia of the Gods?

Journal Article

2001

Cardiac Electrophysiology Review

5

4

422 - 424

2001

13852264 (ISSN)

In summary, most of the evidence suggests that light-to-moderate amounts of alcohol consumption (approximately two to six drinks per week) do not adversely effect ones risk of sudden cardiac death. In the contrary, the largest study on the topic suggests that these modest levels of consumption may actually lower risk of sudden cardiac death. Therefore it appears that these levels of alcohol intake are most likely safe and could be beneficial. The disparate results in the US Physicians' Health Study versus the general Finnish population might have been due to the pattern of alcohol consumption. The authors of the Finnish study point out that heavy consumption at less frequent settings (binge drinking) is common in the Finnish population, and although we have no direct data on the subject, this pattern of drinking was probably uncommon in the US physicians. Although there is no study that directly compares the effects of intermittent binge drinking versus regular modest alcohol intake, one would suspect that the latter pattern is safer with respect to sudden cardiac death given the association of drinking binges with arrhythmias [9]. Despite these possible benefits of low levels of alcohol intake, there may be a fine line between benefit and risk. Once consumption levels increase to 2 or more drinks per day, there is no longer any apparent benefit on sudden death risk and heavier alcohol consumption definitely increases the risk. Therefore the decision whether to recommend small-to-moderate amounts of alcohol intake as a preventive measure against sudden death must be individualized based on the physician's assessment of an individual's propensity to accelerate to moderate-to-heavy drinking.