Alcohol and Cardiovascular Disease—Modulation of Vascular Cell Function

Abstract

Alcohol is a commonly used drug worldwide. Epidemiological studies have identified alcohol consumption as a factor that may either positively or negatively influence many diseases including cardiovascular disease, certain cancers and dementia. Often there seems to be a differential effect of various drinking patterns, with frequent moderate consumption of alcohol being salutary and binge drinking or chronic abuse being deleterious to one’s health. A better understanding of the cellular and molecular mechanisms mediating the many effects of alcohol consumption is beginning to emerge, as well as a clearer picture as to whether these effects are due to the direct actions of alcohol itself, or caused in part by its metabolites, e.g., acetaldehyde, or by incidental components present in the alcoholic beverage (e.g., polyphenols in red wine). This review will discuss evidence to date as to how alcohol (ethanol) might affect atherosclerosis that underlies cardiovascular and cerebrovascular disease, and the putative mechanisms involved, focusing on vascular endothelial and smooth muscle cell effects.

Alcohol Reduces Arterial Remodeling by Inhibiting Sonic Hedgehog‐Stimulated Stem Cell Antigen‐1 Positive Progenitor Stem Cell Expansion

“…Moreover, there is often significant adventitial remodeling in response to vessel injury and adventitial myofibroblasts are believed capable of translocating to the neo-intima and differentiating to vSMC and in this way also contribute to vascular lesion formation (Scott et al 1996; Shi et al 1996). In addition to alcohol effects on lipoproteins(Wakabayashi 2015; Hao et al 2015), we and others have described potentially important effects of alcohol on vSMC growth and migration(Sayeed et al 2002) (Cullen et al 2005; Cahill and Redmond 2012; Shirpoor et al 2013), as well as on vascular endothelial cells(Morrow et al 2008) and monocytes (Cullen et al 2005; Muralidharan et al 2014). The emergence of the concept that resident vascular stem cells, in addition to de-differentiation of vSMC and myofibroblasts as mentioned above, may become activated and contribute to arterial pathology(Orlandi 2015), together with the lack of information as to whether alcohol can regulate stem cells in the adult vessel, provoked our present study.…”

Endothelial Nitric Oxide Mediates Caffeine Antagonism of Alcohol-Induced Cerebral Artery Constriction

“…Both caffeine and alcohol are metabolized in vivo to active compounds that modify vascular function (Echeverri et al, 2010;Cahill and Redmond, 2012). In addition, it is well known that vasoactive properties of caffeine may involve modification of autonomic input, stress hormone levels, and other neural and endocrine systems (Echeverri et al, 2010).…”

Alcohol intake, wine consumption and the development of depression: the PREDIMED study

“…Moderate alcohol intake, especially alcohol from wine, has been repeatedly reported to be inversely associated with the incidence of cardiovascular disease [4-6]. Some of the responsible mechanisms for this inverse association are likely to be involved also in a reduced risk of depression [7,8].…”