Speaker 1: 0:01

Welcome to the Healthy Matters podcast with Dr. David Hilden , primary care physician and acute care hospitalist at Hennepin Healthcare in downtown Minneapolis, where we cover the latest in health healthcare and what matters to you. And now here's our host, Dr. David Hilden .

Speaker 2: 0:19

Hey everybody, it's Dr. David Hilden , and welcome to episode five of the podcast where we are gonna talk about alcohol and your health. The holiday season is upon us again, and we're gonna dive into a subject that's been fueling conversations and bar tabs for centuries. Alcohol from bubbly celebrations to late night regrets. Most of us, or at least many of us, have a story to tell, and many of them do involve drinking. So what's the deal with alcohol and our health? On today's episode, I'm joined by a repeat guest and a friend of mine, Dr. Charlie Resnikoff. He is a specialist in addiction medicine and all kinds of substance use concerns. So Charlie, welcome back to the show.

Speaker 3: 0:56

Thanks. It's great to be here.

Speaker 2: 0:58

Let's start right off with a question that many people have. I like to have a glass of red wine with dinner. Is that healthy?

Speaker 3: 1:03

Uh, we would not say that it's healthy anymore. Uh , it , we used to, we used to , we used to talk about one glass of red wine per day, drinking and moderation. Red wine can be healthy for your heart. We don't say that anymore.

Speaker 2: 1:18

We

Speaker 3: 1:19

Do say that there is low risk alcohol consumption. There are healthy recommendations, but we wouldn't call it healthy. So it's a complicated topic and it's honestly, it's changed in the last three years. It

Speaker 2: 1:31

Really has. Yeah , because I remember, I've been doing this over 20 years, I would say to people I never once told someone, start drinking for your health. Yeah. But we used to say things like, if you enjoy a , a drink or two a day, averaged over the whole week. If it's one or two a day, that's probably okay for you. And even might even be good for your heart. That's not true anymore. Yeah .

Speaker 3: 1:52

We would eliminate that last sentence where we'd say drinking one to two, one for women, two for men per day on average over time is probably okay for you. And then you can have a more in-depth conversation with your doctor about your specific health issues.

Speaker 2: 2:06

Right. So it's maybe okay for you, but it's not, not healthy. Not healthy. It's not beneficial. We used to think it was like, well, everybody in the south of France lives forever. Yeah . And they have gravy and sauces and butter and butter. Good life . They eat a stick of butter for breakfast on their croissant and , but they have red wine and so it's all good. Yeah .

Speaker 3: 2:23

There were, there were two or maybe three things about red wine that raised this belief. Number one, alcohol does probably raise your HDL or your good cholesterol, and that may have some protective effects. And number two, there's a , a compound in red wine called reservatol , and that may also lower your LDL or your bad cholesterol. So red wine may have some beneficial effects on your cholesterol, but the overall effect on your heart is to make it worse. Uh , alcohol causes and exacerbates heart failure can cause atrial fibrillation can cause strokes. And overall it worsens your heart health. But there is this little area where it may indeed improve some of your cholesterol numbers.

Speaker 2: 3:06

Let's rewind back to some real basics to help us all understand what alcohol is and, and what does it do in your body, and why might it be harmful. So we've been drinking alcohol for probably, I don't know who started this, hundreds of years. Thousands. Thousands of years. Thousands of years probably. Yeah . Could you just tell us a little bit about its effects on the body? Um , both why people drink it and enjoy it, and what are some of the harmful effects?

Speaker 3: 3:30

Yeah. I mean, alcohol occurs naturally when fruits or other products ferment, and you don't need to do much to have alcohol be created in the wild. In fact, growing up, we used to <laugh> , we used to watch the birds in our backyard, eat the berries as they got on in the season, the berries on one of our trees, and then get drunk and fly into our window. And

Speaker 2: 3:50

We , because they're fermenting on the tree, that

Speaker 3: 3:53

That may be a bit of a , you know, a ,

Speaker 2: 3:56

A table , a nervous <laugh> . The Resnick cough Family Winery , uh, maybe give that one a pass. We used

Speaker 3: 4:00

To joke about the drunk birds <laugh>. Uh , but, but alcohol occur naturally, and alcohol actually was pretty important to civilization when there weren't reliable sources of potable water. When you couldn't find healthy water, alcohol at low levels will actually be safer to drink because it will kill , uh, contaminants , uh, you know, bacteria, whatnot in the, so alcohol has been part of human civilization for centuries, millennia, in addition to sterilizing water, which is not an issue for us, thankfully anymore. It also causes people to relax. It's called , uh, disinhibition. It takes some of your anxieties down a level. It can relax your muscles as well. So a lot of muscle tension can calm down. People will tend, when their anxieties go away, they tend to have a more enjoyable, you know, fun. They term that we use is jocular. They, they tell more jokes, they laugh more often. So alcohol at low levels can cause people to relax emotionally and physically.

Speaker 2: 4:58

So those sound like positive effects.

Speaker 3: 4:59

Yeah. In the moment they're positive effects, for sure, for most of us. But over time, it's not a sustainable effect. It's not it you're having muscle tension or emotional anxiety. Much better to treat those with our more modern approaches, medications, talk therapy, physical therapy, not as fun as alcohol, but more effective and more safe. So

Speaker 2: 5:20

What are the bad effects in your body? Now we're gonna, we obviously know about some other bad effects. There are societal bad effects, there are alcohol related crimes and car accidents and all that. We can delve into that a little bit later, but I'm talking physically what is bad about it for your body?

Speaker 3: 5:34

Yeah. Alcohol is a solvent. So alcohol dissolves in basically everything. And you can use, you know, we know that around the house we use alcohol to clean surfaces, alcohol dissolves in fat, dissolves in water. And when you drink alcohol, it goes throughout your body everywhere. And because of that, alcohol can have effects on basically every part of your body. And it almost, you name it, any part of your body can be affected by alcohol. And over time, exposure to alcohol is not healthy for almost any part of your body. So, you know, most prominent, I would say the brain, the mental health, sleep, mood, and the digestive tract , your stomach, your intestines, your liver, your pancreas, those are the big ones, but it's not limited to that. But I would say the digestive track and the brain are the big targets for alcohol related harm.

Speaker 2: 6:25

Why would we possibly think it's good for your heart? Like what that whole red wine thing, you, you touched on that a little bit, but if it seems like it's pretty bad for your, all these other parts of your body, why would , did we ever think, is that all just because of the cholesterol effects? Well,

Speaker 3: 6:37

It, it, well, there's a lot of reasons for this. Uh, I think you , uh, mentioned earlier that certain populations like the French , uh, had good cardiac outcomes, had good rates of cardiac disease, and they were drinking wines. So we saw these correlations, this happens a lot in medicine. We notice associations or correlations between behaviors and outcomes. And we sort of concluded that a glass of red wine a day may be cardioprotective because people who drink a glass of red wine a day have lower rates of heart disease. What it may turn out that people who can afford a glass of red wine a day and people who have the temperament of moderation and

Speaker 2: 7:14

Not having four or five,

Speaker 3: 7:15

Those , those are the things that protect you. The having moderation in your life and also having enough , you know, having the financial wherewithal to get a glass of red wine per day. Those may actually be the protective and not the wine in the glass. So the , it was sort of an association of correlation. Our public health people observed and concluded that red wine might help, but in fact, maybe not. Let's

Speaker 2: 7:37

Talk a little bit about people's day-to-day drinking lives and things that might be , um, really relevant to them. The types of things people drink. Mm-hmm <affirmative> . Beer, wine, liquor. Are they all the same? Yeah.

Speaker 3: 7:49

You actually, you left out my favorite cider.

Speaker 2: 7:51

Oh, cider.

Speaker 3: 7:52

Yeah. And cider

Speaker 2: 7:53

Is like , uh, now we're gonna move to the northwest of France. <laugh> . Yes,

Speaker 3: 7:55

Exactly. Or Minnesota. Minnesota has, you know, a beautiful apple production and, and actually has a , a , a , a great industry. I love a produc ci producing hard cider . Mm-hmm <affirmative> . And , uh, cider is one of the oldest drinks consumed in America. Aside from that, you know, I think most of alcohol effects have to do, does not matter what form of alcohol you're drinking. Obviously liquor is more concentrated. It's easier to accidentally drink too much liquor, but alcohol is alcohol whether in whatever form it comes in, there are particular things about all the beer versus wine versus liquor that we can get into. But I think it is really important to understand how much alcohol is in whatever drink you're drinking, and to know what the healthy limit is.

Speaker 2: 8:39

I had a beer, Dr. Resnikoff . Yeah. What does that mean? What does that mean?

Speaker 3: 8:42

Yeah, <laugh>, what does that mean?

Speaker 2: 8:44

What does that mean? Um , my wife gets beers in a juice glass. Yeah. You know, I think it's like four ounces. Yeah. And then like, you'll be at the place and then they'll bring somebody else's beer and it's in this big huge stine and Yeah . That's a beer. Yeah. Is it, it's not the container

Speaker 3: 8:59

Beers range all the way from 4% alcohol, maybe 12 ounces. That might be a traditional beer that you

Speaker 2: 9:07

Buy in a , a can of your standard beer from the , you know, exactly

Speaker 3: 9:11

All the way up to 10% or 11% alcohol in a 16 ounce bottle. And so, which

Speaker 2: 9:18

You'd get that , you'd get drunk off of that.

Speaker 3: 9:19

Yes. And it would be two or even three times the amount of alcohol as that standard beer that you get at a

Speaker 2: 9:25

Liquor store and you get a big 16 ounce thing of it you're having. Yeah . Probably . Is there a, so is there a standard measurement for drinks ? So when I ask a patient how much you drink, which I do every single, probably every clinic I ask people, yeah . I always triple it because whatever people think it is, it's usually more. But what is a drink? What is one? I mean , what should people do in all those various kinds of alcohols?

Speaker 3: 9:45

The standard drink is a little outdated for beer, as you pointed out. Uh , the standard drink is a 12 ounce 5% beer. That's very much your standard commercial beer that you would get in the liquor store.

Speaker 2: 9:58

The smaller cans, everybody, not those big tall ones. But

Speaker 3: 10:00

If you're, if you're drinking a tall boy or a 16 ounce bottle and it's a craft beer, you might just assume that's two drinks. Mm-hmm <affirmative> . I , I think I , that's a safe assumption, but a standard drink is one five ounce glass of wine. And that wine would be 12%. That's pretty standard. So one five ounce, it's not a full wine glass. It's

Speaker 2: 10:19

A , yeah. When they make those big red wine glasses that look like fish bowls, that's to catch the aroma, you're supposed to put a little teeny bit in the bottom. Yes . So like

Speaker 3: 10:26

A five ounce glass of a 12% wine, that's pretty standard. Or a shot, which is one and a half ounces of 40% alcohol, 80 proof alcohol. That's standard as well. It's worth once or twice measuring those out. So you kind of can eyeball it. It doesn't need to be perfect. Yeah. But if you know what a shot looks like and you know what a proper glass of wine look like, you're pretty much there. And you just need to be careful about the alcohol percentage of beer I would add to this. And th those are numbers. So one standard drink, however, if you are drinking, when you're dehydrated on an empty stomach and you're slamming your drink, that drink is gonna hit you real hard. Whereas if you're drinking slowly while you're eating and you know you have food in your stomach and it takes you an hour to finish that one glass, that one glass is gonna be really mellow for you. So it's really important not just to know the quantity of alcohol you're drinking, but the context. How fast are you drinking it? Is there food in your stomach? And are you dehydrated or not? Those are big factors in how you will respond to the alcohol.

Speaker 2: 11:30

How many is too much? Yeah,

Speaker 3: 11:31

Good question. And the first answer to that question is, it depends on the individual. So my mother in later in her life, in her eighties, one drink would be way too much for her. She was apt to have falls, she was having memory issues, she really couldn't drink at all. So there are gonna be some people maybe with some health conditions like liver disease where any is too much. In America in pregnancy, the recommendation is no alcohol. So there are some people where any is too much. That's

Speaker 2: 12:00

A qualification in this country. Yeah. Are French women like pounding it? Yeah .

Speaker 3: 12:04

I think the recommendations in Europe is, are more lax in that drinking and moderation is more accepted in pregnancy, but in America it is recommended not to drink.

Speaker 2: 12:15

So for some people, anything more than zero is probably too much. I mean, the rest in the rest of us , it kind of varies. What, what is then considered to be binge drinking? Right? Because isn't that a higher risk? Right.

Speaker 3: 12:25

So then if you are not in one of those high risk categories, then how much can you drink? And the first answer is for men averaging two a day for women averaging one a day. Now we have many gender diverse patients who don't identify as men or women, and we don't really know how to answer that. But those folks are at high risk for alcohol related harms. So I think talking to those folks about their alcohol use is really important.

Speaker 2: 12:50

So I can have 14 of them on a Saturday night. That's two that's averaged of two a day there,

Speaker 3: 12:55

Doctor . Exactly. So then the next two limits are, number one, binge drinking, which for women is no more than four or more on an occasion. And for men is no more than five or more on occasion. That's still kind of a lot. Yeah. So for three or four drinks in a, in a single occasion should be considered safe if you don't have any other risk

Speaker 2: 13:17

Factors. And you're not driving. Yeah.

Speaker 3: 13:18

And you're not driving. Yeah. Yeah. There is a new category which is called high intensity drinking.

Speaker 2: 13:24

I just heard that term this month, which

Speaker 3: 13:26

Is doubling the binge drink. For men it would be nine or more drinks, and for women it would be eight or more drinks. And that is an exceedingly high risk. And there are a lot of people out there that are doing high intensity binging. So double the recommendation of a binge, which is four or five drinks, depending on your gender. And people get in a lot of trouble in their high intensity binging. So I would say averaging one or two per day, depending on your gender, on any given day, not exceeding four or five. And to really have concern if you're doubling that dose to high intensity binging. So

Speaker 2: 14:01

After the break, we're gonna talk about some specific tips for you to manage your drinking and what to do if you think you might need to get some , uh, professional help. And after the break, I'm gonna ask you what's a hangover? Charlie <laugh> , we're talking with Dr. Charlie Resnikoff about alcohol use and problems that can arise from drinking. Stay with us. We'll be right back

Speaker 4: 14:23

When Hennepin Healthcare says we are here for life. They mean here for you, your life and all that it brings. Hennepin Healthcare has a hospital HCMC and a network of clinics both downtown and across the west metro. They provide all the primary care and specialty care you would expect to find, but did you know they also have services like acupuncture and chiropractic care available at many of their primary care clinics and at their integrative health clinic in downtown Minneapolis? Learn more@hennepinhealthcare.org. Hennepin Healthcare is here for you and here for life.

Speaker 2: 15:02

So we're back talking with Dr. Charlie Resnikoff about alcohol use. So Charlie, what's a hangover? How do you get rid of it? Okay,

Speaker 3: 15:08

A hangover. Good

Speaker 2: 15:10

Question. I wouldn't know <laugh> , so I need you to help me out here. Um,

Speaker 3: 15:13

Yeah. Hangover is the , the after effects of, of alcohol use. And what it is happening in your body is a couple things. Alcohol needs to be broken down by your liver to acid aldehyde, which may sound like formaldehyde, you know, and , and for a reason it's an aldehyde. So acid aldehyde, you can imagine this compound acid aldehyde floating around in your body. It

Speaker 2: 15:35

Doesn't sound good for you.

Speaker 3: 15:36

It makes you feel terrible that , you know, it really makes you feel crummy. And then from there it's broken down into a form of acid called acetate. So your body is literally acidic as it breaks down alcohol. And a lot of hangovers is just your body processing all of these acids and it just takes time. But there are other things happening. When you drink alcohol, you commonly become dehydrated. You also commonly lose essential electrolytes. And I would call out potassium and magnesium. And you commonly aren't eating nutritious healthy food as you're drinking too . Excess buffalo

Speaker 2: 16:14

Wings come on.

Speaker 3: 16:15

Or just nothing. Or

Speaker 2: 16:16

Nothing. Yeah .

Speaker 3: 16:17

<laugh> , we used to have a colleague who would joke that having salted peanuts as you drink would protect you from your , from a hangover. But the , it does emphasize the importance of eating while you drink

Speaker 2: 16:27

Alcohol. Yeah. My college bar was Williams Peanut Bar in uptown Minneapolis. I've been there <laugh> . And you threw your peanut shells on the floor. I think we literally thought that.

Speaker 3: 16:36

Exactly. So getting your hydration improved eating food, including healthy foods that contain potassium and magnesium. And also just understanding this is what your body has to go through to metabolize the alcohol. And some of it's unavoidable when you drink a lot of alcohol, there's no avoiding a hangover. There's no, there's no trick to getting in . Is there,

Speaker 2: 16:55

Are there other ways to prevent? So is everybody, should they all go down to their, their nutritional supplement aisle, but buy a bunch of magnesium and palm those when they're, when they're drinking? Yeah.

Speaker 3: 17:05

And you will hear there's

Speaker 2: 17:07

Not specific to do except not drink. Right?

Speaker 3: 17:08

You will hear specific supplements marketed for this. There's not an evidence to support those. Drink more slowly drink while you eat and listen to your hangover. Your hangover is telling you something that you , and when you choose how much to drink, keep in mind tomorrow , uh, and what you're gonna , what you're gonna experience tomorrow . Is

Speaker 2: 17:26

There any truth to the alternate your drink with a big, huge glass of water?

Speaker 3: 17:29

There's some truth to it. Uh, that's

Speaker 2: 17:31

It probably just slows your drinking down , keeps you hydrated.

Speaker 3: 17:33

Yeah. Those things are, yeah. And you'll be , uh, you'll be visiting the restroom all night. He'll be

Speaker 2: 17:39

<laugh> . So maybe the best tip is don't get so drunk that you have a

Speaker 3: 17:42

Hangover. Yeah , yeah. And listen to your hangover. I mean, it's telling you something and some of it you can't, there's no magic out of it. Your body has to process all that alcohol and it turns into acid, aldehyde and acetate. Yeah. And those are toxic substances.

Speaker 2: 17:54

Let's talk about dry January. So it's sort of taken hold where a lot of people attempt or, and most are successful I imagine, and don't drink any alcohol in the month of January. And many people are gonna be listening to this podcast either in late December or in January. Not all but many. Is that a good idea? Is it beneficial to you to take a break?

Speaker 3: 18:14

I I don't think we would say that it is beneficial to your health. Like you'll live longer or you'll prevent diseases because of dry January. But I do think it's beneficial in a lot of ways. First of all, gives

Speaker 2: 18:26

Your liver a break.

Speaker 3: 18:27

Well , yeah. Yes. That's a good bite . I mean , <laugh> , it'll, it'll give you, it'll feel good. I mean, I think a lot of people by January 1st haven't slept well. Alcohol can affect your sleep. Um, alcohol can affect your nutrition. Maybe you've been overeating as well and you could use some improved sleep, some improved nutrition. And so this would be a way to help that happen. So I for sure it'll, I I see those health benefits separately. I think it teaches people that they can have a good time without alcohol that can extend past January. That's big. That's huge. You can have a great time with your friends. You also learn alternative drinks. There's a lot of great non-alcoholic beverages more than ever. It's actually a amazing

Speaker 2: 19:04

Diet . Even good non-alcoholic beers. Yeah.

Speaker 3: 19:06

Oh, amazing. Non-alcoholic beers. Yep . And, and there's non-alcoholic wine. We used to give that to my mom at dinner. <laugh>

Speaker 2: 19:13

<laugh> .

Speaker 3: 19:14

She, she knew she, she caught on eventually <laugh> . Uh , but there's non-alcoholic wine, there's non-alcoholic beer. There's other non-alcoholic cocktails who teaches you there are these options. And also if you struggle in dry January, that teaches you something about yourself. And if someone commits to a dry January and then can't do it, that's a signal. And that you should pay attention to that signal and you should ask why. And maybe talk to someone about why was it so hard for me to go through January without drinking? So those are all benefits to dry January. But I think there are other ways to, you know, gain those same benefits if you don't want to do dry January.

Speaker 2: 19:52

Those are good tips. That's that . I think that's really wise . Okay. I'm gonna shift a little bit to people who might think they're drinking too much. Maybe they know they're drinking too much or maybe they don't know they're drinking too much, but it's, it's become problematic in their lives. Yeah . Could you talk about when it's time to get help and what help is available?

Speaker 3: 20:08

Yeah, so there's a lot of help. And actually now more than ever, there's many ways for people to get help with their alcohol use. So the first thing, how do I know when it's a problem for me? Well, if you're exceeding the limits for of alcohol, so if you're a man and you're having five or more drinks regularly, especially if you're having 10 or more drinks regularly, if you're a woman, you're having four or more drinks. Especially if you're having eight or more drinks, you should at least ask yourself, honestly, is this a problem for me? And what would you ask? Has it affect my family relationships? Has it affected activities that I used to do? You know, my nephew has a high school concert performance, but I skip it 'cause I wanna be at home drinking. Has it affect my safety? Uh, I'm up on the ladders cleaning out the, the leafs from the gutters. And is that safe with a , with the , the amount of alcohol I'm drinking or driving safety? Has it affected my job? Have I shown up, hung over to my, my work and has that affected my performance at work? So these are the , the types of questions. How much time am I spending every day drinking or recovering from alcohol? These are all questions that you would ask yourself. And if you have some concern when you're asking yourself that questions that the alcohol is affecting your relationships, your work, your activities, taking all your time is related to alcohol, then it might be worth talking to a health professional. And there's two ways to go on this. One is a dedicated addiction professional. And that can be really intimidating to people. And they feel like they're gonna get put in rehab, they're gonna go to 30 day rehab and, and all that. And they , maybe they're not ready for that. The other is to talk to your primary care physician or clinician. Um, your primary care clinician should have some tools to help you drink less and to also help you moderate your alcohol use or to help you be sober if that's your goal. So you can either go the route of talking to an addiction professional or I think much easier just to have an um , mm-hmm . Honest conversation with your primary care clinician.

Speaker 2: 22:07

Are there medications?

Speaker 3: 22:08

Yeah, there's great medications now. There's,

Speaker 2: 22:11

It didn't used to be.

Speaker 3: 22:11

Yeah. There's, you know, four or five different medications that can help you either drink in moderation or be totally sober. And one of the great parts of my job, just last Wednesday, I had a clinic where eight patients showed up with alcohol use disorder and seven of them were doing great on medications and they loved it. And you know, they , and some of them took a medication to help them drink in moderation and some of them took a medication to help them not drink at all. And for them it was working for them. So I, I think there's a lot of great options. Talk to your primary care clinician about that and you can also reach out to an addiction clinician. Those

Speaker 2: 22:49

Are really good tips. There is much more available now than there used to be. So folks, if, if you answered yes to any of those questions, I think I strongly encourage you to seek out some help for that. I wanted to revisit something you said earlier about sleep. Does it help you sleep or does it make your sleep worse?

Speaker 3: 23:04

Great question. What people who drink alcohol at night before bed find is that it kind of knocks them out. So it helps them pass out and go to sleep initially, but they wake up in the middle of the night kind of almost feeling wired and the quality of their sleep is poor. So overall alcohol has a negative effect on sleep and people who drink before bed, you know, every night are just gonna have, be less well rested , be more fatigued throughout the day. Even though sometimes they feel they drink a couple drinks and they go to their bed and pass out. That's not high quality sleep though.

Speaker 2: 23:39

Yeah. That's not good for your sleep. Yeah . It sounds like what you're saying. Okay. To wrap us up, holiday gatherings, family events, the Super Bowl , I dunno , anything, you know, things that people are gathering for. What tips would you give people to drink in a reasonably healthy way?

Speaker 3: 23:55

Yeah, you know, always drink with food or drink after having eaten. Try to drink over time . So like meaning one drink should be consumed over the course of an hour. So sip rather than chug, you know, for the younger crowd, they're drinking games, drinking competitions, that all that stuff is

Speaker 2: 24:14

Problematic. I'm guess those are not a

Speaker 3: 24:16

Good idea. <laugh> that is not a good idea. And especially if you have concern, keep track of how much you drink. Don't lose count, you know ? So I bet

Speaker 2: 24:23

A lot of people do lose count. Oh

Speaker 3: 24:25

Yeah, yeah. Or they go in with a plan and a couple drinks in , they just, you know, go for it and drink as much as they're feeling and then they end up regretting it. Um, I would add another thing, and that is for holiday celebrations, you don't need to have alcohol. One of the good things about dry January is it teaches us you don't need to have alcohol. You can have a wonderful time with your family and not drink alcohol. And if there's stress around drinking in the holidays with your family, I would recommend the holiday brunch, which is something <laugh> , which is something that my family has done and has been really wonderful. We have a wonderful holiday meals together. It's just during the day there's no alcohol. And for those who want to drink alcohol, they can do it later.

Speaker 2: 25:05

That last tip seems really important to me. 'cause everything else is about how to do it safely, but you don't need it at all. Yeah. Is a really good tip to think about. Yeah.

Speaker 3: 25:14

I think we are very reliant on alcohol to have a good time. And I, I was thinking about how like the, the grandkids, the teenage grandkids, you have to tell 'em to put their phone down and it's a little awkward for them at first to rejoin the family at the holiday table. The same thing applies to adults who like to drink wine. If you tell 'em we're going, we're gonna have a , an alcohol free dinner, they're gonna be a little awkward at first, but they'll relax and have a good time. It , it's, it , it'll work out fine. Great

Speaker 2: 25:41

Advice. Charlie. We have been talking with Dr. Charlie Resnikoff , an addiction medicine specialist and good friend of mine here at Hennepin Healthcare in downtown Minneapolis. And listeners, I wish you a safe, peaceful, and healthy holiday season and let's get 2025 off to a great start. Thanks for joining us and I hope you join us in two weeks for our next episode. And in the meantime, be healthy and be well.

Speaker 1: 26:03

Thanks for listening to the Healthy Matters podcast with Dr. David Hilden . To find out more about the Healthy Matters podcast or browse the archive, visit healthy matters.org. Got a question or a comment for the show, email us at Healthy matters@hcme.org or call 6 1 2 8 7 3 talk. There's also a link in the show notes. The Healthy Matters Podcast is made possible by Hennepin Healthcare in Minneapolis, Minnesota, and engineered and produced by John Lucas At highball Executive producers are Jonathan , CTO and Christine Hill . Please remember, we can only give general medical advice during this program, and every case is unique. We urge you to consult with your physician if you have a more serious or pressing health concern. Until next time, be healthy and be well .