Hypertension + Binge Drinking = Stroke
Binge drinking is something that is not recommended for anyone, healthy or otherwise – but more so if that someone suffers from high blood pressure, according to a new study shared on CNN.com.
Researchers based in Yonsei University in Seoul, South Korea, studied 6,100 South Koreans aged 55 years old and above for a period of twenty years. The results of the study showed that men who suffer from hypertension and consume more than six drinks in one sitting – even occasionally – nearly double their risk of succumbing to a stroke or a heart attack.
If a man suffering from hypertension doubles the drink count and consumes 12 drinks or more in one sitting, then that risk increases by five times, when compared to someone who has normal blood pressure.
American Heart Association spokesman Brian Silver, M.D., a neurologist at the Henry Ford Hospital in Detroit, Michigan, said: “Somehow the binge drinking compounds [high blood pressure] — and more than just a little bit.”
The results of the study were found to be more than just plausible by J. Chad Teeters, a cardiologist at the University of Rochester Medical Center in New York, who shared that other studies have previously determined that drinking alcohol can increase a person’s blood pressure by 15 to 20 points. Someone who is already hypertensive and gets this kind of increase in blood pressure certainly runs into the possibility of more than doubling their risk of suffering from a stroke.
Dr. Silver, who is not involved in the study, said further: “There’s something about alcohol that makes the blood vessels more vulnerable to plaque formation and plaque rupture.”
Tags: alcohol drinking, alcohol risks, binge drinking, hypertension alcohol drinking, stroke risks
