Your daily cup of Joe might come with a side of surprising health benefits.
A study published in September in The Journal of Clinical Endocrinology & Metabolism concluded that “Habitual coffee or caffeine intake, especially at a moderate level, was associated with a lower risk of new-onset [cardiometabolic multimorbidity] and could play important roles in almost all transition phases of [cardiometabolic multimorbidity] development.”
Cardiometabolic multimorbidity, or CM, was defined in the study as the “coexistence of at least 2 of the following conditions: type 2 diabetes, coronary heart disease, and stroke.” About 34 million people were affected by CM in 2018, as KERA reported.
The research team, led by Dr. Chaofu Ke, associate professor of epidemiology and biostatistics at Soochow University in Suzhou, China, analyzed data from the UK Biobank collected from about 180,000 people. None of the individuals tracked in the study had cardiometabolic diseases at the outset.
The information collected and analyzed included the participants’ self-reported consumption of coffee, black, or green tea and their development of cardiometabolic diseases over a long period of time, as recorded through primary care records, hospital records, and death certificates.
According to the study, consuming a moderate amount of coffee — about three cups per day — reduced the risk of new-onset CM by 48.1%. Three cups of coffee contain about 300 milligrams of caffeine, roughly the equivalent of seven to eight cups of tea. Those who drank somewhat less caffeine daily — between 200 and 300 milligrams — reduced their risk of developing CM by about 40.7%.
Study participants who averaged less than one cup of coffee per day, or none at all, did not see any significant drop in their risk of developing CM.
However, when it comes to caffeine, moderation is key.
Other studies have shown that consuming more than 400 milligrams of caffeine daily could lead to symptoms such as heart arrhythmia, rapid heart rate, anxiety, headaches, and more while also increasing a healthy person’s risk for cardiovascular disease.
The study by Ke’s team was merely observational and did not specify a mechanism by which caffeine consumption could decrease the risk of CM. Dr. Sreenivas Gudimetla, a cardiologist at Texas Health Fort Worth, suggested that caffeine may affect insulin sensitivity or be associated with a reduction in LDL cholesterol, per KERA. Still, these causal effects have not been proven.
Peter M. Kistler, MD, a professor and head of arrhythmia research at Alfred Hospital and Baker Heart Institute in Melbourne, Australia, noted that coffee beans have more than 100 biologically active compounds, which can reduce oxidative stress and inflammation, boost metabolism, and inhibit the gut’s absorption of fat, as reported by The Dallas Express.
“It is important to emphasize that, while these data suggest a relationship between caffeine, tea, and coffee and a reduced risk of a combination of cardiovascular diseases, we need to be careful before we infer true causal effects,” Dr. Gregory Marcus, associate chief of cardiology for research at the University of California, told CNN. “It remains possible that the apparent protective effects do not truly exist at all and that the positive associations are all explained by some as yet unknown or unmeasured true determining factor.”
As research on the correlation between caffeine and CM continues, doctors recommend that patients reduce their risk of cardiometabolic diseases by eating a heart-healthy diet, exercising regularly, managing weight, cholesterol, and blood pressure, and avoiding smoking.
