Alcohol and Aging: How These Factors Interact in Your Body

During our younger adulthood years, night outs and binge drinking were very often enjoyed. However, aging has already arrived in your life story and it becomes a turning point with alcohol because your body reacts to this substance now differently.

Alcohol is substance commonly found in drinks such as beer, wine, vodka, whiskey, rum and other distilled spirits that have undergone fermentation or the conversion of sugars found in grains and grapes and distillation which have a higher concentration of alcohol. Based on the 2012-2013 NESARC III survey, over 55% of the adults ages 65 and over still drink alcohol.

Angelic Love Home Care, a trusted non-medical home care agency in Framingham MA, sees a prevalent alcohol problem for some elders who cannot quit this substance. Medical experts have been trying to work their way out this problem; however, like drugs, a relapse is common. Today, you will learn more on what you can do to avoid these two major factors on interacting with each other and prevent the negative repercussions that might lead to premature death.

• Water in Our Body

  The wrinkles and skin sagging is part of the normal process of aging where the body contains lesser and lesser water. However, the body still contains the regular or even higher amount of water daily. For alcohol drinkers, it is harder for the body to dilute alcohol that is absorbed causing a higher blood alcohol concentration.

• Intoxication and Fall

  Getting intoxicated from alcohol can logically increase an older person’s risk of falling, getting fractures, and having a car accident. Given that older people already have balance problems because of their physiological conditions, alcohol can worsen their condition. In addition, older people have longer recovery periods.

  We all know how alcohol can impede our way of balance especially when we drink too much. So for older people, they might get the greatest effects leading to a slower brain activity, judgment, and reaction time for the next day. This is why alcohol intoxication can also be fatal to your elderly loved ones.

• Skin Aging Acceleration

  Indeed, experts have constantly reminded older every one of us that alcohol accelerates skin aging. Signs like puffiness, red cheeks, wrinkles, and dryness often occur on people who have faced heavy drinking for years. It dehydrates the body which of course, includes your skin.

  Hence, if you want to age gracefully without looking prematurely saggy and soggy, reduce the amount of alcohol intake starting today. If you have been drinking for a while now, it takes time to fully get rid of alcohol in your system but it is never impossible to do so.

• Pros and Cons for the Heart, Brain & Liver

  Long-term alcohol intake can cause premature skin aging, liver & heart damage, and memory disorders such as dementia. Alcohol is known to decrease the brain’s volume, influence mood that often leads to behavioral changes, increase the risks for cirrhosis and liver cancer, and too much alcohol increases high blood pressure and risks for abnormal heart rhythms. In addition, you should know that hangovers last longer with age.

  However, specialists often have mixed ideas for seniors who are “light drinkers”. For those who take alcohol lightly and very much occasionally, alcohol in moderation can lower the risks of having heart disease since it can dissolve fats preventing blood clots to form. Hence for older people, the National Institute on Aging recommends that people older than 65 years old should drink no more than seven (7) alcoholic drinks in a week and should be gradually reduced over time.

• Medication Interaction

  It is very common for older people in the U.S. to take about 15-18 prescriptions a year. However, if your elderly loved ones are alcoholic drinkers, then you should know on how alcohol can interfere with prescription and OTC medications. This is because alcohol can lessen or strengthen the drugs’ efficacy. What is more problematic is that some medications already contain alcohol.

For more information on the possible repercussions of alcohol to aging, call Angelic Love Home Care, a reliable non-medical home care agency in Framingham MA today! We can help your elderly loved ones grace through aging!