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Coffee May Help Prevent Diabetes
Coffee May Help Prevent Diabetes -- Posted by Gumbo on 11-14-04 09:59
Coffee May Help Prevent Diabetes
But Tea, Decaf Don't Seem to Do the Trick
By Charlene Laino
WebMD Medical News Reviewed By Michael Smith, MD
on Wednesday, June 18, 2003
June 18, 2003 (New Orleans) -- A jolt of java may do more than get you going
in the morning. Drinking four or more cups of coffee a day appears to help
prevent diabetes, Harvard researchers report.
It's not the first time that a study has suggested that the popular brew may
protect against the blood sugar disorder that affects at least 17 million
Americans. Last year, Dutch doctors reported that heavy coffee drinkers are
half as likely to develop diabetes as people who consume two cups or less a
day.
"If it was really true, maybe we could just forget about exercise and sit in
front of the TV and sip coffee all day," researcher Frank Hu, MD, PhD, says
in jest. Hu, associate professor of nutrition and epidemiology at the
Harvard School of Public Health, presented the research Tuesday at the
American Diabetes Association 63rd Scientific Sessions.
Hu wasn't convinced that coffee could help prevent diabetes because
short-term studies suggest that caffeine interferes with the body's ability
to handle blood sugar -- by reducing the body's sensitivity to insulin.
Insulin is one of the main hormones that keeps blood sugar in check.
So the researchers set out to see if they could replicate the findings in
the 100,000-plus men and women whose health they have been following for
about two decades.
It's Good for Men and Women
The more coffee the men and women drank, the more it seemed to help prevent
diabetes. The findings held true even after accounting for other risk
factors linked to diabetes, including age and weight.
For men:
a.. 1 to 3 cups of coffee a day dropped the risk of diabetes in men by 7%.
b.. 4-5 cups a day cut the risk of diabetes by 30%.
c.. 6 or more cups of coffee a day dropped the risk of diabetes by more
than 50%.
For women:
a.. No effect on diabetes prevention was seen for women who drank 1 to 3
cups a day.
b.. Four cups or more a day reduced their risk of diabetes by about 30%.
c.. 6 cups did not seem to be any better than four cups.
Decaf or Regular?
Caffeine might be coffee's best-known ingredient, but it's not the only one,
Hu notes. Coffee houses dozens of other substances that could affect disease
risk. There's magnesium, niacin, potassium, and even such antioxidants as
tocopherol.
Hu's team reasoned they could tease out the effects of caffeine on diabetes
prevention by also looking at tea and decaf coffee.
"Decaf has the same amount of these other substances, but less caffeine," Hu
says. "Tea has other substances and is relatively low in caffeine."
Four or more cups of decaf coffee a day was associated with a modest effect
on diabetes prevention. But the findings could have been due to chance, Hu
says.
Tea had no impact on diabetes prevention, the researchers found.
The researchers then looked at total caffeine intake from coffee, sodas, and
other foods, and found it, too, appeared to help prevent diabetes. Men and
women who consumed the most caffeine were about 25% less likely to develop
diabetes compared with those who consumed the least.
I'm a Believer
The new findings have made a believer out of at least one former skeptic,
and a key one at that: Terry E. Graham, PhD, who performed one of the
studies showing caffeine reduces the body's ability to handle blood sugar.
"When the Dutch study came out, I was shocked," says Graham, chairman of
human biology & nutritional sciences at the University of Guelph in Guelph,
Canada. "But now, with this second study that shows the same thing, you
start to believe it."
The Harvard study is more thorough, he says, with more accurate data about
the participants' coffee habits over 10 to 15 years. "Plus, they evaluated
tea and decaf, which the first study didn't."
Some clues into why the short-term and long-term studies arrive at such
different results might come soon, he says. Vanderbilt University
researchers who are studying compounds produced when coffee beans are
roasted appear to have homed in on some with disease-fighting properties.
In the meantime, Hu says he is not yet ready to recommend coffee to help
prevent diabetes.
"We still need more study," he says. "But it's intriguing. And it's not
detrimental -- one thing coffee lovers don't have to worry about."
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SOURCES: American Diabetes Association 63rd Scientific Sessions, New
Orleans, June 13-17, 2003.Frank Hu, MD, PhD, associate professor of
nutrition and epidemiology, Harvard School of Public Health. Terry E.
Graham, chairman, human biology & nutritional sciences, University of
Guelph, Guelph, Canada.
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