Preventive cardiologyAlcohol Drinking and Cardiovascular Risk in a Population With High Mean Alcohol Consumption
Section snippets
Methods
This cross-sectional study examined participants in the Cohorte Lausannoise (CoLaus) study, a population-based study of 6,187 Caucasian community-dwelling men and women aged 35 to 75 years. Participants were selected from a random sample of all age-eligible adults living in the city of Lausanne, Switzerland (population 117,161). The details of eligibility criteria have been described previously.1 All participants gave written informed consent and the institutional review board in Lausanne
Results
The baseline characteristics of the participants are listed in Table 1. About three quarters of the participants (73%) consumed alcohol, and more than half (55%) had moderate consumption (1 to 13 drinks/week); 16% had high consumption (14 to 34 drinks/week), and 2% had very high consumption (≥35 drinks/week). Wine was the most frequent beverage type consumed, and beer consumption was predominant in men. Women were less likely to be in the high or very high alcohol consumption groups and,
Discussion
In this population-based study including a substantial proportion of high drinkers, increasing alcohol consumption was associated with higher HDL cholesterol levels but also with increased levels of total cholesterol and triglycerides and increased blood pressure values, resulting in a J-shaped relation with 10-year CAD risk. The protective effect of alcohol on CAD risk disappears because the increase in blood pressure offsets the benefits of the increase in HDL cholesterol.
A previous
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This study was supported by research grants from the Faculty of Biology and Medicine of Lausanne, Switzerland, and from GlaxoSmithKline, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.