Effectiveness of Advice to Reduce Alcohol Consumption in Hypertensive Patients

The relation between alcohol consumption and blood pressure is well recognized, and advice to reduce alcohol plays an important part in the management of hypertensive patients. We have evaluated the effectiveness of this advice in a randomized, controlled, single-blind clinical study. After a 2-week run-in period, hypertensive men regularly consuming more than 20 units/wk (1 unit=10 g) of alcohol were randomly assigned either to the “advice” or control group and were seen at 2-week intervals over an 8-week study period. The outcome measures werereported alcohol consumption (1-week retrospective diary), markers of alcohol consumption (serum γ-glutamyl transpeptidase, aspartate amlnotransferase, uric acid, mean corpuscular volume), and blood pressure (sitting and standing). Over 18 months, 67 men who drank more than 20 units/wk of alcohol were seen. Twenty-six either were excluded, refused to participate, or dropped out due to nonattendance. Forty-one patients completed the study. After intervention, reported alcohol consumption fell from 60 units/wk to around 30 units/wk in the advice group, whereas it remained between 50 and 60 units/wk in the control group (analysis of variance [ANOVA] F=7.1, p