Movember: Alcohol, especially liquor, increases prostate risk and skews PSA

November – or MOvember – is the month when men's health issues are brought into the spotlight as guys kiss their razors goodbye in favor of a furry face, the lumbersexual look, or a well-groomed mustache, beard, soul patch or goatee. The campaign has been around for over a decade, starting as a fun excuse to can the Gillette, but now has become linked with prostate health awareness. (Read the episode #64 transcript or share the YouTube video.)

Let’s start with the alcohol. A 2013 study published in the International Journal of Cancer raises concerns about alcohol's ability to throw off prostate cancer tests. The PSA test – PSA is prostate-specific antigen – measures for elevated antigen levels which are a possible indicator of prostate cancer. Levels may be abnormally high for other reasons as well, such as an enlarged prostate or various lifestyle factors.

In the study, 2,400 men who had PSA-detected prostate cancer and 12,700 men who didn't were evaluated. The investigators found a modestly higher risk of prostate cancer among heavy drinkers, they also observed evidence of lower PSA levels associated with increasing consumption of alcohol. This means it can be more difficult to detect prostate cancer using PSA levels among men who are heavy drinkers.

In an older study of Harvard alumni, researchers concluded wine or beer consumption was unassociated with prostate cancer; however, moderate liquor consumption was associated with a significant 61-67 percent increased risk of prostate cancer. Keep in mind, the study subjects were Harvard alumni, so they were probably affluent and weren't dolts, but other lifestyle factors such as diet or exercise were not charted.

Clinically, alcohol increases the amount of urine entering the bladder. It also causes the exit to the bladder to constrict, making urination more difficult and alcohol will hinder the ability of the prostate muscle to relax, further irritating the bladder and making enlarged prostate symptoms worse. For Movember and the rest of the year, alcohol does more potential harm than help for the prostate, or any other part of the body, regardless of the type of alcohol consumed.

Stevens is the Director of Marketing for The Manor.  Visit alcohologist.com for a replay of CBS Sports' Power Up Your Health featuring Scott Stevens.  Host Ed Forteau led a discussion on risky myths of about "healthy" drinking.  Lucy Pireel's "All That's Written" included a feature on Every Silver Lining Has a Cloud called "When alcohol doesn't work for you anymore."  Details on the third literary award for Every Silver Lining Has a Cloud and the first for Adding Fire to the Fuel also can be found on www.alcohologist.com, plus the NEW book, Adding Fire to the Fuel, is now available. Download the FREE Alcohology app in the Google PlayStore today

Alcohol use can be a Parkinson's disease contributing factor, hampers treatment

Chronic use of alcohol often creates brain chemistry imbalances. It's a chicken and egg thing: The alcohol use also can stem from brain chemistry imbalances. Regardless of which comes first, one problem related to the alcohol use and brain chemistry could be Parkinson's disease. (The Sobriety :60+ #63 on alcohol and Parkinson's disease

 transcript

 or share the YouTube video)

Parkinson's research has come a long way – thanks in part to actor Michael J. Fox and boxer Muhammed Ali. The central nervous system disorder is characterized by symptoms – like tremors, rigid limbs and slow movement – stemming from the death of cells that produce dopamine, a chemical in the brain. After following up with patients who had been to the hospital due to alcohol use, Swedish researchers investigated whether alcohol use disorders -- including the disease of alcoholism -- are linked to Parkinson's disease and found a relationship between the two.

Patients who abused alcohol were 1.4 times more likely to develop Parkinson's disease than patients who did not abuse alcohol. The risk was heightened among patients who had been to the hospital for an alcohol use disorder before they were 44 years old. Alcohol can cause a flux in the dopamine levels, but also damages brain tissue at the cellular level, as covered in a previous episode of The Sobriety :60+. More research lies ahead for the alcohol/Parkinson's connection, but enough connection has been revealed in the Swedish research and related animal studies to debunk old-school thinking that alcohol had a protective effect when it came to Parkinson's.

If the evidence-based science isn't enough, consider this: alcohol is a central nervous system depressant and can cause many symptoms that mimic, exacerbate, or mask Parkinson's. And another point of fact is that anti-Parkinson’s meds and the alcohol are a harmful combination and the mix can even overwhelm the liver's ability to metabolize either drug. The 10 percent of your body mass between your ears operates best within the delicate balance of the brain chemicals with which we're all born and specifically the dopamine and serotonin. Tossing a known toxin into the balance isn't likely to yield changes for the good, and may cause permanent change for the worse.

Visit alcohologist.com for a replay of CBS Sports' Power Up Your Health featuring Scott Stevens.  Host Ed Forteau led a discussion on risky myths of about "healthy" drinking.  Lucy Pireel's "All That's Written" included a feature on Every Silver Lining Has a Cloud called "When alcohol doesn't work for you anymore."  Details on the third literary award for Every Silver Lining Has a Cloud and the first for Adding Fire to the Fuel also can be found on www.alcohologist.com, plus the NEW book, Adding Fire to the Fuel, is now available. Download the FREE Alcohology app in the Google PlayStore today

Beer drinking doubles gout risk

Gout is an extremely painful form of arthritis. Episodes of gout strike suddenly without warning. Severe cases of gout may lead to major disability and even kidney failure. More men experience the condition than women, although the difference is less dramatic among the elderly. What can cause gout? Alcohol use… especially beer drinking. (Share the YouTube video or read the transcript) 

In a research study performed by the medical journal Lancet, more than 47,000 male medical professionals with no history of gout were followed for up to 12 years. In that period, men who drank the most alcohol daily had twice the risk of developing the disorder as men who did not drink. Beer drinkers increased their risk by 50 percent for every daily beer, while those who drank hard liquor increased their risk by 15 percent for each drink.

The alcohol decreases water in the body. That's part of the problem. What makes the difference is yeast. Beer is made with yeast, yeast is a purine, purines cause an increase in uric acid which is produced by the kidneys. (Think urine… which is the way the body gets rid of uric acid.) Too much uric acid in the blood causes gout and triggers attacks, which are felt in the joints. The uric acid is actually crystalized in the joint, which causes the pain. The big toe is a common gout target.

It's not a life threatening condition except when you consider it signals a problem with the kidneys. Sure you have two of them… but you only have two of them and the uric acid problem impacts both.

Hereditary factors lead to gout, but environmental causes, such as regular alcohol consumption, are behind the increase in cases of gout in the past thirty years. It's a quality of life kind of thing: Is the temporary relaxation from a beer worth the discomfort of recurrent, tender, hot, joint pain long after the buzz is gone? Not to mention the increased risk for more than 60 other diseases brought on by alcohol use.

Visit alcohologist.com for a replay of CBS Sports' Power Up Your Health featuring Scott Stevens.  Host Ed Forteau led a discussion on risky myths of about "healthy" drinking.  Lucy Pireel's "All That's Written" included a feature on Every Silver Lining Has a Cloud called "When alcohol doesn't work for you anymore."  Details on the third literary award for Every Silver Lining Has a Cloud and the first for Adding Fire to the Fuel also can be found on www.alcohologist.com, plus the NEW book, Adding Fire to the Fuel, is now available. Download the FREE Alcohology app in the Google PlayStore today

Alcohol's risk for the 1 in 5 with IBS, and the 4 in 5 who don't

Alcohol is a triple threat for irritable bowel syndrome (IBS). Alcohol can cause it if you don't have IBS already. Alcohol will trigger symptoms if you do have IBS, and alcohol is a catalyst for making bad symptoms worse.  (Read the full article and share the YouTube video)

IBS is a functional disorder of the intestine, so it stands to reason introducing a strong toxin to the intestine isn't going to have stellar results. One in five people have to deal with IBS at some point in life. It afflicts twice as many women as men. It's as obnoxious as it sounds: Harsh cramps and bloating can make it feel like there is serious damage to the intestines, but IBS won't actually damage the bowels. In fact it usually passes in days. Sometimes it takes weeks. The symptoms will get worse with even just one drink, regardless of whether it's a beer or something stronger.

Blood tests can reveal IBS and are used to rule out other, more serious conditions. The very same tests can reveal a bit about your drinking. A complete blood count to measure the size of red blood cells and number of white cells – a reduction in either shows the impact of longer stretches of drinking or binges. The level of magnesium is below baseline in those with the disease of alcoholism. High levels of triglycerides – a type of cholesterol – also can be a tip about alcohol-related trouble with the liver. And high-levels of protein and uric acid in the blood also can be indicators of alcohol-related trouble. More about the uric acid in the next Sobriety :60+ segment. Taken individually, these alcohol-use markers may be markers of other ailments, too, but when they all show up in the bloodwork for IBS, blame the alcohol.

Irritable bowel syndrome is not a life-threatening problem, but that doesn't make it any less irritating. There isn't anything a drink didn't make worse.
Visit alcohologist.com for a replay of CBS Sports' Power Up Your Health featuring Scott Stevens.  Host Ed Forteau led a discussion on risky myths of about "healthy" drinking.  Lucy Pireel's "All That's Written" included a feature on Every Silver Lining Has a Cloud called "When alcohol doesn't work for you anymore."  Details on the third literary award for Every Silver Lining Has a Cloud also can be fou.nd on www.alcohologist.com, plus the NEW book, Adding Fire to the Fuel, is now available. Download the FREE Alcohology app in the Google PlayStore today

Dying for a drink: The alcohol death toll this weekend by the numbers... it's way more than impaired driving

Now that Halloween is out of the way (a huge drinking holiday when it falls on a weekend, by the way) it's time to get to a real-life scary story. (Read the enitre article online) By the numbers, alcohol is going to claim more lives this weekend than any other drug – in fact, more than all of the illicit drugs combined. Recent news items have focused on the $250 billion annual cost to the U.S. in hard-dollar expenditures and lost productivity. The death toll is a more human, and more frightening, story. In a single weekend, there are:

• 15 alcohol overdoses – The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's (CDC) Vital Signs puts it starkly: 2,200 die every year from drinking too much, too fast. Very high levels of alcohol – a central nervous system depressant drug – shut down the brain's control of critical body functions, leading to death for an average of six people every day. (Watch The Sobriety :60+).
• 43 murders – According to the Bureau of Justice Statistics' (BJS) report Alcohol and Crime, for more than four in 10 convicted murderers, being held either in jails (43.7 percent) or in state prisons (41.4 percent), alcohol use is reported to have been a factor in the crime. The younger generations are the most at risk: 95 percent of all violent crime on college campuses involves the use of alcohol by the assailant, according to the National Council on Alcoholism and Drug Dependence (NCADD).
• 75 “unintentional” deaths – Theses are falls, drug interactions, fires, suffocation/choking and drowning deaths. They account for 22,000 deaths every year… half of them involve alcohol use. As cited in alcoholism recovery book, Every Silver Lining Has a Cloud, "58 percent of fire fatalities have alcohol in their systems, which presumably kept them from fleeing safely and 45 percent of drownings are alcohol-related.”
• 110 car wreck fatalities – A little under one in three fatal car wrecks is alcohol-related (31 percent). Sometimes, it's a single-car accident with only one occupant: The impaired driver. Fate doesn't always work that way. While tragic for the family of that driver, media attention usually shines the spotlight on the unimpaired victims of an impaired driver. From 6 p.m. Friday to 6 a.m. Monday, 110 people die on an average weekend as a result of drinking and driving. The numbers are higher the weekends between Thanksgiving and New Year's… slightly lower the rest of the year… and 15 percent lower on weekdays.
• 136 cancer deaths – Approximately 560,000 people died from cancer in 2009, the year for which the researchers analyzed alcohol-related cancer death rates in a related article. Of those deaths, nearly 20,000 were caused by alcohol-linked cancers. Breast cancer accounted for the most common alcohol-related cancer deaths among women, contributing to 15 percent of all breast-cancer deaths. Among men, cancers of the mouth, pharynx, larynx and esophagus accounted for the most alcohol-linked cancer deaths.
• 227 liver disease deaths – Cirrhosis is the 12th leading cause of death in the United States, but it isn't a synonym for another disease: Alcoholism. Alcohol use, not necessarily alcohol dependence, is the primary cause of all liver diseases including cirrhosis. The amount of alcohol that can injure the liver varies greatly from person to person. In women, as few as two to three drinks per day have been linked with cirrhosis and in men, as few as three to four drinks daily. By CDC records, in 2013, there were 71,713 total liver disease deaths among individuals aged 12 and older and 46.4 percent involved alcohol. Among males, 48.9 percent of the 46,240 liver disease deaths involved alcohol. Among females, 42.7 percent of the 25,433 liver disease deaths involved alcohol.

Ignoring even more alcohol-related deaths from stroke and heart disease (no, alcohol is not hearth healthy, see 2014 Examiner article) that is an average of one alcohol related death every six minutes from quitting time Friday until wake-up time Monday. The weekend total: 606. The number preventable: 606.

Visit alcohologist.com for a replay of CBS Sports' Power Up Your Health featuring Scott Stevens.  Host Ed Forteau led a discussion on risky myths of about "healthy" drinking.  Lucy Pireel's "All That's Written" included a feature on Every Silver Lining Has a Cloud called "When alcohol doesn't work for you anymore."  Details on the third literary award for Every Silver Lining Has a Cloud also can be fou.nd on www.alcohologist.com, plus the NEW book, Adding Fire to the Fuel, is now available. Download the FREE Alcohology app in the Google PlayStore today

Scott Stevens presents for Red Ribbon Week

Here's a shortened teaser version of the alcohol education presentation -- What Causes Problems, is One --  for middle and high schools. The entire 50-minute program is on YouTube at https://youtu.be/Pt2zZHfaBIE

Visit alcohologist.com for a replay of CBS Sports' Power Up Your Health featuring Scott Stevens.  Host Ed Forteau led a discussion on risky myths of about "healthy" drinking.  Lucy Pireel's "All That's Written" included a feature on Every Silver Lining Has a Cloud called "When alcohol doesn't work for you anymore."  Details on the third literary award for Every Silver Lining Has a Cloud also can be fou.nd on www.alcohologist.com, plus the NEW book, Adding Fire to the Fuel, is now available. Download the FREE Alcohology app in the Google PlayStore today