Whether or not drinking wine is good for your heart has been the focus of a mountain of research over the past decade — with confusing findings.
While numerous studies have reported that consuming wine in moderation can reduce the risk of heart disease, almost as many have reported the opposite — that even small amounts of alcohol increase cardiovascular risks.
That’s left us all in the uncomfortable position of not knowing what to believe.
Luckily, the debate on wine’s effects on the heart has finally been settled, with research confirming not only its benefits but how much protection can gained from a glass
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Biomarker provides accurate insight
Conflicting reports from previous research came down to this: most studies relied on participants’ self-reported wine consumption.
Obviously, this is a big flaw when you consider the fact that many people will under-report how much wine they drink or might simply remember inaccurately.
So, for the PREDIMED trial reported in the European Heart Journal, researchers decided to measure participants’ wine-drinking habits more scientifically. They used urinary tartaric acid (a compound found in grapes and rarely in any other dietary sources) as an objective biomarker for measuring wine consumption.
“Thus, tartaric acid emerges as a valuable short-term biomarker (several days to a week) for assessing wine consumption, provided that the intake of grapes and their derivatives is excluded,” the research team explained.
And that’s how they believe they’ve proven — once and for all — that light to moderate wine intake is tied to a lower risk of long-term cardiovascular disease (CVD), including combined heart failure, myocardial infarction, stroke and CVD death.
The Goldilocks number for heart benefits
According to the researchers, compared with people with the lowest tartaric acid level, those with levels in the 12-35 μg/mL range benefited from cardiovascular protection over a median of nine years of follow-up. That equates to drinking 12-35 glasses of wine per month.
Additionally, the results showed that participants with tartaric acid levels >3 µg/mL at baseline, who experienced an increase over one year, had a 59 percent lower risk of CVD than those whose levels decreased during the same period.
“The findings suggest that wine consumption in real-life conditions, unaffected by the often artificial influences of a clinical trial setting, might have a more beneficial impact on cardiovascular health than previously thought,” the study authors noted.
However, it’s important to note that while moderate wine consumption conferred heart health benefits, these benefits were weaker at lower consumption levels (3-12 glasses per month) and zero at 1-3 glasses of wine per month.
Benefits also disappeared with higher consumption equivalent to 1.25 glasses per day.
In other words, the old advice of moderation in everything still works.
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It’s all about those polyphenols
Of course, the secret to how wine confers those benefits on the heart all boils down to its high levels of polyphenols.
According to the study authors, “Polyphenols have been demonstrated to exert a variety of health benefits that could confer cardioprotective properties to wine, such as anti-inflammatory properties,” they wrote. “Therefore, multiple mechanisms may explain the cardioprotective properties of polyphenols.”
The most studied polyphenol superstar is resveratrol, known for promoting heart health in three very important ways, while also supporting balanced blood sugar and boosting brain health.
All that, and the results of this study, are great news for those of us who enjoy a glass of wine, it’s also wonderful for anyone who prefers not to drink. After all, resveratrol isn’t just found in wine, you can also take it in supplement form and find it in these dietary sources.
Sources:
Cardiovascular Protection Tracks With Wine Intake, Now Provable With Urinary Marker — MEDPAGETODAY
Why alcohol and a disease-free life just won’t mix — Easy Health Options