No association of alcohol use and the risk of ulcerative colitis or Crohn’s disease: data from a European Prospective cohort study (EPIC)

Background The role of long -term alcohol consumption for the risk of developing ulcerative colitis (UC) and Crohn’s disease (CD) is unclear. Aim s For the first time, t o prospectively assess the role of pre -disease alcohol consumption o n the risk of developing UC or CD. Methods Nested within the European Prospective Investigation into Cancer and Nutrition (EPIC - IBD ), incident UC and CD cases and ma tched controls where included. At recruitment, participants completed validated food frequency and lifestyle questionnaires. Alcohol consumption was classified as either: non -use, former, light ( ≤ 0.5 and 1 drink/week), below the recommended limits (BRL) ( ≤ 1 and 2 drinks/day), moderate ( ≤ 2.5 and 5 drinks/day) , or heavy use (>2.5 and >5 drinks/ day) for women and men, respectively ; and was expressed as consumption at enrolment and during lifetime. Conditional logistic regression was applied adjusting for smoking and education , taking light users as the 3 Abstract Background The role of long -term alcohol consumption for the risk of developing ulcerative colitis (UC) and Crohn’s disease (CD) is unclear. Aim s For the first time, t o prospectively assess the role of pre -disease alcohol consumption o n the risk of developing UC or CD. Methods Nested within the European Prospective Investigation into Cancer and Nutrition (EPIC - IBD ), incident UC and CD cases and ma tched controls where included. At recruitment, participants completed validated food frequency and lifestyle questionnaires. Alcohol consumption was classified as either: non -use, former, light ( ≤ 0.5 and 1 drink/week), below the recommended limits (BRL) ( ≤ 1 and 2 drinks/day), moderate ( ≤ 2.5 and 5 drinks/day) , or heavy use (>2.5 and >5 drinks/ day) for women and men, respectively ; and was expressed as consumption at enrolment and during lifetime. Conditional logistic regression was applied adjusting for smoking and education , taking light users as the reference. Results Out of 262,451 participants in 6 countries, 198 UC incident cases/792 controls and 84 CD cases/336 controls were included. At enrolment, 8%/27%/3 2%/2 3%/1 1% UC cases and 7%/2 9%/4 0%/19%/ 5% C D cases were: non -users, light, BRL, moderate and heavy users, respectively. The corresponding figures for lifetime non -use, former, light, BRL, moderate and heavy use were : 3%/5%/2 3%/44%/19%/6% and 5%/2%/25%/44%/23 %/1% for UC and CD cases , respectively. There were no associations between any categories of alcohol consumption and risk of UC or CD in the una djusted and adjusted odds ratios . Conclusion There was no evidence of association s between alcohol use and the odds of developing either UC or CD