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Vulnerability to cardiac disease.
1Biomedical Research Branch, National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism, Rockville, Maryland 20857.
Recent Developments in Alcoholism : an Official Publication of the American Medical Society on Alcoholism, the Research Society on Alcoholism, and the National Council on Alcoholism
|January 1, 1991
Summary
Chronic alcohol consumption harms the heart, causing reduced contractility, arrhythmias, and hypertension. While stopping alcohol may reverse some damage, the progression to permanent injury and interactions with other substances remain unclear.
Area of Science:
- Cardiovascular Science
- Toxicology
Background:
- Chronic ethanol (alcohol) consumption adversely affects the cardiovascular system.
- Alcohol intake is linked to myocardial dysfunction, arrhythmias, and hypertension.
- The potential cardioprotective effects of modest alcohol consumption remain controversial.
Purpose of the Study:
- To summarize the detrimental cardiovascular effects of chronic ethanol consumption.
- To highlight the association between alcohol and arrhythmias, including potentiation with trauma.
- To discuss the reversibility of ethanol-induced myocardial injury and knowledge gaps regarding permanent damage and drug interactions.
Main Methods:
- Review of existing literature on ethanol's cardiovascular effects.
- Analysis of clinical significance of alcohol-potentiated arrhythmias.
- Examination of the relationship between alcohol, hypertension, and coronary artery disease.
- Discussion of ethanol's interaction with other drugs and chemicals.
Main Results:
- Chronic ethanol intake leads to decreased myocardial contractility, reduced cardiac output, and induced arrhythmias.
- Alcohol consumption increases the risk of sudden death in alcoholics and potentiates trauma-induced arrhythmias.
- A link exists between chronic alcohol use and hypertension.
- Reversal of ethanol-induced myocardial injury is possible upon cessation, but the transition to permanent damage is not fully understood.
- Interactions between ethanol and other drugs (cocaine, amphetamines, nicotine, digitalis) can be fatal.
Conclusions:
- Chronic ethanol consumption poses significant risks to cardiovascular health, including arrhythmias and hypertension.
- Further research is needed to understand the mechanisms of permanent heart damage from alcohol and its potentially fatal interactions with other substances.