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Drinking eight or more alcoholic beverages each week could have a damaging effect on the brain, according to a new study published in Neurology, the medical journal of the American Academy of Neurology (AAN).
That volume of alcohol was linked to a higher risk of developing a type of brain lesion called hyaline arteriolosclerosis, which causes a narrowing and thickening of blood vessels and impedes the flow of blood in the brain.
This can lead to memory and cognition problems, according to a press release from AAN.
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"Heavy alcohol consumption is a major global health concern linked to increased health problems and death," said study author Alberto Fernando Oliveira Justo, PhD, of University of Sao Paulo Medical School in Brazil, in the release.
Drinking eight or more alcoholic beverages each week could have a damaging effect on the brain, according to a new study. (iStock)
"We looked at how alcohol affects the brain as people get older. Our research shows that heavy alcohol consumption is damaging to the brain, which can lead to memory and thinking problems."
The researchers examined brain autopsies of 1,781 people averaging 75 years of age, focusing on any signs of brain injury or damage.
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They then gathered information about the participants’ alcohol consumption from family members, the AAN release stated.
Those who were classified as heavy drinkers had a 133% greater risk of having vascular brain lesions (abnormalities in the brain's blood vessels) compared to people who never drank.
The risk was 89% higher than former heavy drinkers and 60% higher than moderate drinkers.
"Heavy alcohol consumption is a major global health concern linked to increased health problems and death," the study author said. (iStock)
The heavy drinkers and former heavy drinkers were also more likely to develop tau tangles, which are protein deposits in the brain that are a common marker of Alzheimer’s disease.
When determining the level of consumption, the researchers defined one drink as containing 14 grams of alcohol, equating to about 350 milliliters (ml) of beer, 150 ml of wine or 45 ml of distilled spirits.
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Among those who used to be heavy drinkers, researchers noted a decline in cognitive function and lower brain mass proportional to body mass, an effect that was not found among current heavy drinkers or moderate drinkers, the release stated.
Heavy drinkers had an average 13-year shorter lifespan compared to those who never drank alcohol.
"Heavy alcohol consumption is a major global health concern linked to increased health problems and death."
"We found heavy drinking is directly linked to signs of injury in the brain, and this can cause long-term effects on brain health, which may impact memory and thinking abilities," said Justo in the release.
"Understanding these effects is crucial for public health awareness and for continuing to implement preventive measures to reduce heavy drinking."
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Dr. Earnest Lee Murray, a board-certified neurologist at Jackson-Madison County General Hospital in Jackson, Tennessee, was not involved in the study, but confirmed that heavy alcohol consumption is known to cause shrinkage of the brain and has long been known as a modifiable risk factor in stroke.
"This article shows that even a few alcoholic drinks per week increases the risk of vascular abnormalities on the brain," he told Fox News Digital.
"Interestingly, increased amounts of alcohol also lead to the development of neurofibrillary tangles, which are the same pathological findings seen in Alzheimer’s. Previous heavy alcohol consumption was associated with reduced brain mass and cognitive function."
A doctor said that alcohol — a known depressant — readily crosses the blood-brain barrier, which plays a role in its depressive and addictive effects. (iStock)
While some studies have suggested that small to moderate amounts of alcohol might be protective of vascular health, Murray noted that a growing body of evidence is showing that any amount of alcohol is "likely detrimental to both vascular health and cognitive abilities."
"This stresses the importance of alcohol moderation or even alcohol cessation, even in younger people, to mitigate the risk of dementia development later in life," he advised.
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Dr. James Berry, addiction psychiatrist and chair of behavorial medicine and psychiatry at the WVU Rockefeller Neuroscience Institute, said these findings are consistent with studies over the past several years that showed heavy drinking poses health risks and may contribute to a shorter lifespan.
"Doctors should be having conversations with their middle-aged and older patients about the effect drinking has on the brain as we age, especially when it comes to cognitive decline," Berry, who was not involved in the study, told Fox News Digital.
"Some risk factors are not within our power to change, but there are a number of risk factors that we can control. Cutting down or stopping drinking is definitely one of them."
Potential limitations
One key limitation of the study is that it did not assess participants’ health before death. There was also a lack of information about how long the alcohol consumption lasted.
Dr. Amanda Berger, SVP of science and research for the Distilled Spirits Council in Washington, DC, provided the below statement to Fox News Digital.
"This study has several significant limitations that undermine its validity. For example, key variables, including alcohol consumption, were based on postmortem interviews of next-of-kin, and alcohol questions only assessed three months prior to death, which may not be representative of longer-term patterns of drinking."
One key limitation of the study is that it did not assess participants’ health before death. There was also a lack of information about how long the alcohol consumption lasted. (iStock)
Berger also noted that the "heavy drinker" category grouped everyone who consumed eight or more drinks in a week – "whether they had eight drinks per week or 50" – limiting the ability to know whether the risk of certain outcomes was driven by those who were "truly heavy drinkers."
"The study findings link alcohol consumption to certain brain measurements, but, importantly, the study does not demonstrate that there is a relationship between ‘moderate’ or ‘heavy’ alcohol consumption and cognitive ability," she added.
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The researchers acknowledged that the study only shows an association and does not prove that heavy drinking causes brain injury.
The study was supported by The São Paulo Research Foundation.
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