Alcohol consumption and risk of dementia up to 27 years later in a large, population-based sample: the HUNT study, Norway

Abstract

The relationship between alcohol consumption and dementia risk is unclear. This investigation estimates the association between alcohol consumption reported in a population-based study in the mid-1980s and the risk for dementia up to 27 years later. The entire adult population in one Norwegian county was invited to the Nord-Trøndelag Health Study during 1984–1986 (HUNT1): 88 % participated. The sample used in this study includes HUNT1 participants born between 1905 and 1946 who completed the questionnaire assessing alcohol consumption. A total of 40,435 individuals, of whom 1084 have developed dementia, are included in the analysis adjusted for age, sex, years of education, hypertension, obesity, smoking, and symptoms of depression. When adjusting for age and sex, and compared to reporting consumption of alcohol 1–4 times during the last 14 days (drinking infrequently), both abstaining from alcohol and reporting consumption of alcohol five or more times (drinking frequently) were statistically significantly associated with increased dementia risk with hazard ratios of 1.30 (95 % CI 1.05–1.61) and 1.45 (1.11–1.90), respectively. In the fully adjusted analysis, drinking alcohol frequently was still significantly associated with increased dementia risk with a hazard ratio of 1.40 (1.07–1.84). However, the association between dementia and abstaining from alcohol was no longer significant (1.15, 0.92–1.43). Equivalent results for Alzheimer’s disease and vascular dementia indicated the same patterns of associations. When adjusting for other factors associated with dementia, frequent alcohol drinking, but not abstaining from alcohol, is associated with increased dementia risk compared to drinking alcohol infrequently.

Alcohol Intake and Cognitively Healthy Longevity in Community-Dwelling Adults: The Rancho Bernardo Study

“…Our results are in contrast to those of a population study in Norway that found that frequent drinking was associated with increased dementia risk compared to non-frequent drinking [11]. However, in that study, frequent drinkers were defined as those consuming five or more drinks in a 14-day period and comprised only 6.5% of the population, a drinking pattern very different than that observed in our cohort.…”

Role of ADH1B rs1229984 and ALDH2 rs671 gene polymorphisms in the development of Alzheimer's disease

“…Previous studies have reported on the relationship between alcohol consumption and Alzheimer's disease, and have indicated that low levels of alcohol consumption could protect against dementia and reduce the mortality rate of mild Alzheimer's disease (Berntsen et al, 2015;Ilomaki et al, 2015). However, one large-scale study has reported that frequent alcohol consumption is associated with elevated risk of dementia (Langballe et al, 2015). Ethanol is not toxic to the human body; however, the acetaldehyde oxidized from ethanol is toxic.…”

Natural Products for the Prevention and Treatment of Hangover and Alcohol Use Disorder

“…Excessive ingestion of alcohol, whether acute or chronic, is responsible for a tremendous disease and disorder, not only alcoholic hepatitis, cirrhosis and hepatocarcinoma, but also a series of other dysfunctions including pancreatitis, cardiomyopathy, hypertension, stroke, and fetal alcohol syndrome [10][11][12][13]. Excessive consumption of alcohol also results in damage to the central nervous system, such as polyneuritis, cerebellar degeneration, alcoholic dementia, pellagra encephalopathy, Marchiafava-Bignami and Wernicke-Korsakoff syndromes [14][15][16]. Moreover, epidemiological studies have identified chronic alcohol consumption as a significant risk a key mediator of hangover syndrome, and demonstrated that various antioxidants could suppress the adverse events caused by alcohol exposure [39].…”