It is well known that excessive drinking increases the risk of cancer.
So, you might wonder if it's okay to drink a little alcohol every day, but a study found that's not the case at all.
If you look at the risk of developing digestive cancer, the frequency of drinking is more related than the amount of alcohol consumed.
A research team led by Professor Jeong-eun Yoo of the Department of Family Medicine at Seoul National University Hospital Gangnam Center and Professor Dong-wook Shin of the Department of Family Medicine at Samsung Seoul Hospital conducted a study on about 11 million adults aged 40 and over who had no history of cancer diagnosis among the examinees who participated in the national health checkup from 2009 to 2011. He said today (1st) that he confirmed this fact by following up up to a year.
The research team divided them into non-drinkers, mild drinkers (0~104g), moderate drinkers (105~209g), and heavy drinkers (≥210g) according to their weekly alcohol intake.
Heavy drinking group refers to drinking more than 3 bottles of soju per week.
The medical community recommends that men should not exceed 210 g of alcohol per week.
The research team compared and analyzed their risk of developing gastrointestinal cancers such as esophagus, stomach, colon, liver, biliary tract, and pancreas according to their alcohol intake and frequency of drinking.
As a result, the risk of developing gastrointestinal cancer increased with weekly alcohol intake.
The risk of developing digestive cancer in the heavy drinking group was 1.28 times in the non-drinking group.
This is the number when the risk of digestive cancer in the non-drinking group is set to 1.
Drinking frequency also had a big impact.
Daily drinking had a 1.39 times higher risk of digestive cancer compared to non-drinkers.
However, it was found that the amount of alcohol consumed per serving increases the risk of digestive problems depending on the intake to some extent, but does not have a significant effect if it exceeds a certain amount.
The group who drank 5 to 7 drinks at a time had a 1.15 times higher risk of developing gastric cancer compared to the non-drinker group.
The research team interpreted this as suggesting that the frequency of drinking was a more important factor in the development of gastrointestinal cancer than the amount of alcohol consumed.
Professor Yoo said, "Through this study, we found that not only the amount of alcohol consumed but also the frequency of drinking was closely related to the occurrence of digestive cancer. You have to be careful with what you do,” he said.
The research results were published in the latest issue of the American Medical Association journal, JAMA Network Open.