Moderate drinking may boost cognition in women

NEW YORK, Apr 12 (Reuters) In a multi-ethnic sample of older adults living in upper Manhattan, women who reported a moderate alcohol intake achieved higher cognition scores than those who said they did not drink, New York-based researchers report in the journal Stroke.

''We found,'' lead researcher Dr Clinton B Wright told Reuters Health, ''that women who reported drinking between one drink weekly and two daily, had better performance on a global cognitive measure given at the same time as those that reported being never drinkers.'' Wright and colleagues at Columbia University conducted the study in more than 2200 men and women, ranging in age from 62 to 76. Slightly more than half were black, about a quarter were Hispanic and a similar proportion was white.

Reported alcohol intake levels were classified into five groups: never, past, less than 1 drink per week, 1 drink per week up to 2 drinks per day, and more than 2 drinks per day.

Scores on the ''Mini-Mental State Examination'' were higher in those who had up to 2 drinks per day than in those who did not drink, the investigators found. On multivariate analysis, the relationship was statistically significant for women but not for men.

Summing up, Wright noted that, ''we cannot say from this study that alcohol caused better cognitive function, but the fact that our population includes less-studied black and Hispanic participants suggests that prospective studies in this group are needed to examine this further.'' REUTERS KD SP1000