A good deal of research has brought to the fore the certainty that high blood pressure and diabetes can increase the risk of stroke or cerebrovascular accident. Now, a new study has found that, in middle-aged people, binge drinking can be even more dangerous than these other factors .
The research, developed by a team of experts from the International Center for Clinical Research of the Santa Ana Hospital of the University of the Czech Republic, analyzed 11,544 same-sex twins with a follow-up for 43 years (until 2010), during which the participants completed questionnaires about your diet and alcohol consumption and also facts about your blood pressure, smoking, diabetes, and other health risks.
Throughout this period, nearly 30% of the study participants had a stroke. By dividing the participants into groups based on their alcohol consumption, the researchers found that consuming more than two alcoholic drinks a day during middle age increased the risk of stroke by 34% inadvertently in both identical twins – unless that coincide in the amount of alcohol consumed.
Thus, regardless of genetic factors, excessive alcohol consumption in middle age increases the risk of stroke even more than traditional risk factors such as high blood pressure and diabetes: “Now we have a clearer idea about these risk factors , how they change with age, and how the influence of alcohol causes changes as we age. For middle-aged adults, avoiding more than two alcoholic beverages a day could be a way to prevent stroke after reaching the age of 60 ”, clarifies Pavla Kadlecová, co-author of the study.
The team has published their findings in Stroke , a journal of the American Heart Association (AHA).
