TranceAddict Forums (www.tranceaddict.com/forums)
- Chill Out Room
-- Do You Drink More Than 100 Drinks a Month?

Do You Drink More Than 100 Drinks a Month?

What a sad sad day . There go my lofty goals ...


Heavy Social Drinkers Show Brain Damage, Study Finds

By Maggie Fox, Health and Science Correspondent
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Heavy social drinkers show a pattern of brain damage similar to that seen in hospitalized alcoholics -- enough to impair day-to-day functioning, U.S. researchers said on Wednesday.

Brain scans show clear evidence of damage, and tests of reading, balance and other functions show people who drink more than 100 drinks a month have problems, the researchers said.

"Oftentimes alcoholics are the last ones to know they have a problem," said Dr. Peter Martin of Vanderbilt University in Tennessee, who wrote a commentary on the report.

"I think this is the first study of its kind that has looked at brain functioning in individuals who are heavy social drinkers who have not gone to get treatment for their alcoholism," added Martin, a professor of psychiatry who specializes in addiction.

Dieter Meyerhoff of the University of California San Francisco and colleagues examined 46 chronic, heavy drinkers and 52 light drinkers recruited using newspaper ads and flyers.

They used magnetic resonance imaging to look at physical brain structures and measured various brain chemicals associated with healthy brain function.

"The enrollment criterion for heavy drinkers was the consumption of more than an average of 100 alcoholic drinks per month for men over 3 years before the study (80 drinks for women)," the researchers wrote in their report, published in the journal Alcoholism: Clinical & Experimental Research.

One drink is usually defined as a serving of spirits, a glass of wine or a can or bottle of beer.

Standard tests of verbal intelligence, processing speed, balance, working memory, spatial function, executive function, and learning and memory were given to the volunteers.

"Our heavy drinkers sample was significantly impaired on measures of working memory, processing speed, attention, executive function, and balance," the researchers wrote.

Measures of brain chemicals and structures showed some of the same damage seen in alcoholics who were in the hospital or treatment centers, although with a slightly different pattern in the brain, they said.
The study is unusual in that most studies of brain damage from alcohol are done in people who have undergone treatment.
"What our findings indicate is that brain damage is detectable in heavy drinkers who are not in treatment and function relatively well in the community," Meyerhoff said in a statement.

Martin noted the volunteers in the study had gone without a drink for 12 hours and could thus be showing evidence of alcohol withdrawal rather than actual permanent brain damage.

"The problem of studying people who are out there drinking is you are never sure whether these are enduring effects or acute effects," Martin said in a telephone interview.

"Would these people, if they dried for a period of three or four weeks, would they have these abnormalities?"

Martin said it was most likely the damage was real and long lasting. "My personal experience is that there is an awful lot of evidence ... showing that the more people drink and the longer they drink, the more likely they are to have cognitive impairments."

Meyerhoff said moderate alcohol use for most adults translated to up to two drinks a day for younger men and one drink a day for women and older people.

"Our message is: Drink in moderation. Heavy drinking damages your brain ever so slightly, reducing your cognitive functioning in ways that may not be readily noticeable. To be safe, don't overdo it," Meyerhoff said.

http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle....70&pageNumber=1

hmmm 100 drinks in a month eh. ill put it on my 'short term goal' list. well see if we can get that accomplished sometime soon.

April 19th will be one year since the last time that I drank alcohol.

Oh boy, my friend is definitely over that. He's not too bright to begin with though, so it shouldn't affect him too much.

Yep can drink that much some months, depends on what is going on at uni really

Thats it! Thats what must explain why European's are the brightest of folks

thats seriously horrible news to me. i work at the bars and not a month goes by where i dont drink 100 alcoholic drinks in a month... that figure also dramatically rises around spring break

not to mention that heavy drinking rapes your liver too.

thats 3.5 drinks a day. That is nothing. I probably have close to 200 hehe. Rawrrrr. 4.0 in school so screw you!

Oh well, guess I'll have to live with brain damage =P

this isnt really shocking...

quote:

Originally posted by RubiK Cube Yep can drink that much some months, depends on what is going on at uni really

Amen to that.

quote:

Originally posted by Nalin not to mention that heavy drinking rapes your liver too.

Well, the last time I was at the doctors I specifically requested a liver function test ... supposedly it's aok.

Hmmmm maybe I should race my liver against my brain and see which one gives out first

quote:

Originally posted by occrider Well, the last time I was at the doctors I specifically requested a liver function test ... supposedly it's aok. Hmmmm maybe I should race my liver against my brain and see which one gives out first

haha, well all jokes aside its scary shit, + you're still young, 24/25 if i remember correctly? in any case liver cancer is gonna take till your 40s/early 50s to develop, and then of course as we all know cancer isn't just sealed death, its sealed PAINFUL death, so you gotta be careful man, as a matter of fact, speaking from a eastern european background where its probably more common for people to abuse their bodies in order to drink their sorrows away, i can attest that its (almost) always been liver cancer they died of in late 30s/40/early 50s as opposed to brain problems/strokes/seizures ? although i'll bet they were mentally pretty fucked up as well, but in any case, you get my point.


all i can say is that im glad i dont have that problem - even though i love to drink myself - i mean REALLY appreciate wine, hard liquor, the occasional beer, but damn, doing it moderately is still very satisfying.

NOOO THAT CANT BE TRUE!!!!! ITS LEGAL! THE GOVERNMENT WOULDNT WANT TO HARM US!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

now that explains alot

My friends and I have three levels

"I AM NOT DRINKING TONIGHT" = >1 but <6 beers
"Im drinking tonight" = >6 <12
"im Jrinkin tonight" = >12

i think ive totally abstained uhhh twice this month.

This study is hopelessly flawed and a blatant attempt by prohibitionists to advocate their "cause."

I'd generally love to read the actual study before slamming it, but just from the article you can tell it's a grade-A waste of money and effort.

quote:

46 chronic, heavy drinkers and 52 light drinkers

These numbers are way too small to show anything.

quote:

"The enrollment criterion for heavy drinkers was the consumption of more than an average of 100 alcoholic drinks per month for men over 3 years before the study (80 drinks for women)," the researchers wrote in their report, published in the journal Alcoholism: Clinical & Experimental Research.

This is just sad. The distribution of those 100 drinks over time, as well as other factors such as whether they're taken with food, if you're using any other drugs (legal or otherwise), et cetera, are highly important factors which appear to have been ignored entirely. Inconsistencies among these variables could easily result in skewed, or completely inaccurate, results.

quote:

"Would these people, if they dried for a period of three or four weeks, would they have these abnormalities?" Martin said it was most likely the damage was real and long lasting. "My personal experience is that there is an awful lot of evidence ... showing that the more people drink and the longer they drink, the more likely they are to have cognitive impairments."

Am I the only one who finds Martin's answer to this extremely pertinent question somewhat unsatisfactory?

So let me get this straight: his "personal experience" is that there is an "awful lot of evidence" that his entire experiment isn't fundamentally flawed because it fails to account for the possibility that the symptoms are caused by withdrawal rather than any permanent damage?

Well, I feel better now. I would have expected him to say that his personal experience indicated that this entire study was a sham and a complete waste of money and time.

If I had to describe this study in one word, the word would be "shitty." If I could use two words, it would be "very shitty."

The Arbiter's ruling: Pay them NO heed.

Powered by: vBulletin
Copyright © 2000-2021, Jelsoft Enterprises Ltd.