Older patients at risk from heart failure might benefit from the moderate intake of alcohol, a study has found. A team of scientists at Emory University School of Medicine and Yale University School of Medicine in the United States looked at 2,235 patients, with an average age of 74. None of them had heart failure when the study began. Research found that moderate drinking seemed to reduce the risk of developing heart failure, regardless or not of whether they had had a heart attack or not. Dr Jerome Abramson, from Emory University, said: "We expected that moderate drinking would be linked to a lower incidence of heart failure because moderate drinking is associated with a lower risk of heart attack - which in turn would lower heart failure risk." "What was surprising was that moderate drinking was linked to less heart failure independent of heart attack risk." "That suggests alcohol is lowering the risk of heart failure through another pathway than the one that lowers risk of heart attack." Those with the highest levels of alcohol consumption within the "moderate" range had the lowest rates of heart failure, 47 per cent less than compared to non-drinkers in general. The type of alcohol involved appears to be inconsequential, with similar reductions for beer, wine or spirits. The study was published in the Journal of the American Medical Association. Source: BBC
