Long-Term Patterns of Alcohol Use in Older Different-Sex Couples: Concordant Drinking Appears Initially Protective but Predicts Declines in Health Over Time.

OBJECTIVE

Longitudinal patterns of alcohol use among older couples may have important implications for health. This study identified trajectories of alcohol use among different-sex couples and their associations with health over 24 years.

METHOD: Participants included 9,823 older married/cohabiting different-sex couples from the Health and Retirement Study (HRS), in which participants complete surveys every 2 years. We included couples with at least three waves of alcohol and health data between 1996 and 2020.

RESULTS

Dual-trajectory latent class growth analysis revealed five longitudinal couple-level trajectories of alcohol use: concordant infrequent/abstaining, concordant light, concordant moderate, discordant husband heavy wife light, and discordant husband moderate wife infrequent/abstaining. Self-rated health was higher on average but decreased more rapidly over time for concordant moderate compared with concordant infrequent/abstaining husbands and wives. On average, chronic health conditions were higher for concordant infrequent/abstaining than for concordant light and concordant moderate couples. The number of conditions increased more rapidly over time for concordant infrequent/abstaining and discordant husband heavy wife light compared with concordant light and discordant husband moderate wife infrequent/abstaining couples.

CONCLUSIONS

These findings reveal the importance of considering couple patterns of drinking amount and drinking concordance to understand the impact of alcohol use on health among older couples.