Coffee Can Surprisingly Reduce Hospital Stays for Irregular Heartbeat
Who among you love coffee as much as I do? My average coffee intake is 6 cups a day, and sometimes brings it up to 8. In the morning, right after getting in the office, I’ll go straight to the pantry and make my first cup. That’s about 7:00 o’clock in the morning. Before the clock hits 8, I’m done with my second cup. I won’t have my third cup until it’s 10. And then, I need another right after lunch. That’s already four and it’s only lunch break.
Sadly, our trusted men in lab coats and medical scrubs say too much caffeine can endanger health, so I needed to cut on my coffee intake, replacing some with water. I’ve started on this about 2 years ago. Recently, though, researchers found that drinking more coffee reduced the likelihood that patients would be hospitalized for irregular heartbeats. But it has to be kept moderate to be safe and beneficial. Arthur Klatsky, the study’s lead investigator and a cardiologist at Kaiser’s Division of Research said, “people who are moderate coffee drinkers can be reassured that they are not doing harm because of their coffee drinking.”
Klatsky’s study looked at 130,054 adults who filled out questionnaires regarding their coffee and tea drinking habits from 1979 to 1985. Their health status was then followed until 2008. Of those who drank four or more cups of coffee daily, 18 percent reduction in risk of hospitalization was consistent for both men and women, regardless if they came from different ethnic groups, and if they are smokers or nonsmokers. And there’s a 7 percent lower hospitalization risk for those who drank 1 to 3 cups of coffee daily.
However, Klatsky was cautious at saying that we shouldn’t jump to the conclusion that there is a protective effect of coffee, although the study suggests there might be. This is because the research doesn’t prove a cause-and-effect relationship between reduced risk and coffee drinking or that coffee protects the heart against such heartbeat irregularities.
