subject: Different Patterns of Alcohol Consumption Have Different Effects [print this page] Different Patterns of Alcohol Consumption Have Different Effects
When people are asked how much Thanksgiving shots or other alcohol they drink, they usually take an average. Someone, for instance, might say that he drinks twelve shots each month. What does this say? Is this good, or is this bad? Actually, it depends. There are many ways of looking at this data. That person could be drinking twelve drinks in one day every month, or he could be drinking about three drinks a week each month. The effects of each pattern on a person's health are very different.
Therefore, the frequency or pattern of consumption must also be taken into consideration when determining how Thanksgiving shots and other alcoholic drinks affect a person. The sad thing is most studies do not include this detail. For that reason, their results are inconclusive. Fortunately, some studies do include this factor. Those studies should be our main focus.
In studies that take the patterns of alcohol consumption into consideration, a surprising discovery was made. The key factor was not what men were drinking. It does not matter whether they were drinking beer or Thanksgiving shots. How much they were drinking at a time does not even matter that much, too. What really matters, the study found, is the frequency of alcohol intake.
When the amount of alcohol was held constant, it was found that those who were drinking at least three to four days a week, or even more, had lower risks of heart attack when compared to those who had one drink a week. This means binge drinking is a big no-no.
Thanksgiving shots are indeed delicious, but try not to drink excessive in one sitting. Instead, it is better to spread it out. A particular number of shots, for example, might be okay if spread over a week, but it might be considered harmful if taken in just one sitting. In other words, don't be such a hog.
