Measurement error with respect to characterization of the dose, duration, and pattern of alcohol consumption may explain some discordant findings between alcohol consumption and pancreatic cancer risk [40]. Few population-based studies have analyzed the relationship between pancreas cancer and binge alcohol consumption [6, 14, 16, 61]. Of these, one study observed that increased risks were mainly in the highest categories of alcohol consumption, and were stronger among African Americans than for whites [16]. Although the authors reported no association between pancreatic cancer and binge drinking [16], the definition of binge drinking that was used (≥3 drinks/week) was lower than that used in our analyses based upon the United States Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System study [50, 51]. Our observation that binge drinking (≥5 drinks/episode, >70 g of alcohol)—even when occurring years before diagnosis or among moderate alcohol consumers—was associated with increased cancer risk, suggests that the pattern of drinking may be an important mediator of effect. Averaging alcohol exposure over weeks, months, or years, classifying consumption into broad categories, and/or computing lifetime alcohol exposures to measure total consumption, may not
