Coffee linked with lower depression risk in women

Caffeine is the most frequently used central nervous system stimulant in the world, and coffee consumption accounts for about 80 percent of caffeine use.

Drinking coffee offers a boost of energy and a lift in well being, said Alberto Ascherio of Harvard School of Public Health.

"This short-term effect is what drives the consumption of caffeine," said Ascherio, whose study appears in the Archives of Internal Medicine.

"Here we are looking at long-term chronic use of caffeinated coffee," Ascherio said in a telephone interview.

His team studied more than 50,000 women enrolled in a health study of nurses. The women had an average age of 63, and none were depressed when they enrolled in the study.

Ascherio's team measured coffee consumption based on data on the women for 14 years dating back to 1976. They then classified the women according to how much coffee they drank and followed them for an additional 10 years.

"We found that those women who regularly drink four or more cups of coffee a day have 20 percent lower risk of developing depression than those who rarely or never drink coffee," Ascherio said.

The team focused specifically on coffee, but they had similar findings when they looked at overall caffeine consumption, including caffeinated soft drinks and chocolate. They found that women who were in the top fifth of caffeine consumption had a 20 percent lower risk of depression than women in the bottom fifth.

The team built a two-year gap or latency period between when they measured caffeine consumption and their assessment for depression to make sure they were not just capturing women who were too depressed to be regular coffee drinkers.

Ascherio said there have been very few studies that look at the long-term effects of coffee consumption. One smaller study in Finland showed men who drank a lot of coffee were less likely to commit suicide.

And Ascherio's own team has shown that drinking a lot of coffee may be protective against Parkinson's disease in both men and women.

He said it is not yet clear how coffee might protect against depression, but there are some hints.

Animal studies have shown that caffeine protects against certain neurotoxins. And brain receptors that respond to caffeine are concentrated in the basal ganglia, an area that is important for both depression and Parkinson's disease.

Ascherio said low-dose, chronic stimulation of these receptors may make them more efficient.

He stressed that the study does not prove that coffee lowers depression risk -- only that it might be protective against depression in some way.

And many more studies will be needed to show whether coffee can be used to prevent depression, Ascherio said.

SOURCE: bit.ly/pjSydu Archives of Internal Medicine, September 26, 2011.

Fascinating Coffee

Coffee facts – did you know?
There are so many misconceptions about coffee like it accelerates heart disease, gives you stomach ache, makes you put on weight, causes cancer, etc – the list goes on, but these are generally misconceptions and myths, especially if coffee consumption is solely blamed for these conditions. Recent research has proved otherwise and just like at the beginning of the coffee journey when coffee was seen as a great blessing, you will be glad to know that it still is. 

So for example did you know that ….
A cup of well prepared coffee has more anti-oxidants than a bowl of fruit – OK ! you’re asking what are anti-oxidants – a simple explanation, they are one of the many elements used to help fight cancer so rather than causing cancer, coffee might help you fight it.
Coffee accelerates the impact of paracetemol (headache pills for some), which means that if you have a headache and you take a headache pill which contains paracetemol and follow it with a cup of coffee, it can help get rid of your headache faster, provided you don’t go banging your head against the wall.

In general, follow the rule of life for most things – “too much of anything is bad for you”. True, some people might feel nervous and unable to sleep if they have one cup of coffee, and true too, some people might down 20 espressos a day and not feel anything – it’s all about tolerance. I like coffee but I don’t have more than 5 cups of any type of coffee a day. However, I also have a double espresso an hour before I go to bed and it won’t keep me from falling asleep. However, for some people, any type of caffeine after midday affects them for the rest of the day. You’ve just got to know yourself and not push the boundaries, so to take it out on coffee, is just a simple excuse – what else did you eat and what kind of lifestyle do you lead ?