Researchers from Harvard say that people who drink three or more alcoholic drinks a day may suffer a stroke more than a decade earlier than those who drink less.
The study also found that excessive drinking is not just linked to strokes earlier in life, but also larger, deadlier brain bleeds and even long-term brain damage.
The researchers leveraged data from 1,600 adults, with an average age of 75 years. All of the adults in the data set were hospitalized for intracerebral hemorrhage, a type of stroke caused by bleeding inside the brain.
The participants were all asked about their drinking habits during their hospital stay, whether directly or through family members, with 7% ultimately classified as heavy drinkers. For the study, heavy drinkers were considered those having three or more drinks daily, where a drink equates to a 12-ounce beer, a 5-ounce glass of wine, or a 1.5-ounce shot of liquor.
Heavy drinkers were found to have brain bleeds at an average age of 64, more than 10 years younger than the average age of 75 for the non-heavy drinkers. Not only that, their brain bleeds were 70% larger on average.
The researchers say heavy drinkers were twice as likely to have bleeding deep in the brain and almost twice as likely to have bleeding that spread into the brain’s fluid-filled space. Moreover, the heavy-drinking group was three times more likely to have severe white matter damage, a condition linked to long-term cognitive decline and brain aging.
This is not the first time alcohol has been linked to a higher risk of stroke. However, the latest research shows drinking may also accelerate small vessel disease, making the brain more susceptible to severe strokes, and driving longer recovery periods, says lead author Dr. M. Edip Gurol of Harvard University.
“Reducing heavy alcohol use may not only lower a person’s risk of bleeding stroke, but it may also slow the progression of cerebral small vessel disease, which in turn may reduce the chances of having another stroke, cognitive decline and long-term disability,” Gurol said in a press release.