Chuck Bednar for redOrbit.com – @BednarChuck
Enjoying a few cups of coffee each day could reduce your risk of heart disease by keeping your arteries from becoming clogged, according to a new Korean-led study published online Tuesday in the international peer-reviewed journal Heart.
According to BBC News, researchers from the Kangbuk Samsung Hospital and Sungkyunkwan University in Seoul and colleagues from the US and Malaysia studied more than 25,000 men and women who underwent routine health screenings at their places of employment.
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They found that those who consumed a moderate amount of coffee (three to five cups per day) were less likely to have early signs of heart disease. As the researchers told CBS News, drinking the caffeinated beverage was linked to reduced calcium build-up in the arteries, which is one early sign of hardening of the blood vessels and the risk for cardiovascular disease.
Perhaps related to type 2 diabetes
Dr. Eliseo Guallar, a professor from the department of epidemiology and medicine at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health in Baltimore and one of the authors of the study, emphasized that while it’s impossible to establish a direct, causal relationship between coffee and reduced calcium in the arteries, the link between the factors was strong.
The reasons for this association are not known, but Dr. Guallar told CBS that it could be because coffee reduces a person’s risk of developing type 2 diabetes, which in turn is a risk factor for hardening of the arteries. While the doctor did not advise people to start drinking coffee just to prevent heart disease, but noted that people “should not be concerned about coffee intake.”
Scanning away
Dr. Guallar and his colleagues used medical scan to assess heart health in their study, according to BBC News. Specifically, they were searching for any disease of the coronary arteries, which supply blood to the heart. In coronary heart disease, a gradual build-up of fatty materials on the walls of these arteries cause them to become clogged.
The specific type of scan used by the study authors looks for small calcium deposits on the walls of those coronary arteries, which can provide an early warning that the processes responsible for this disease are underway. None of the employees had external signs of cardiovascular disease, but visible calcium deposits were found on more than 10 percent of their scans.
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The scan results were then compared to the employees’ self-reported daily coffee consumption habits, the British news outlet added. After accounting for other factors, including genetics and exercise habits, they found that those who consumed three to five cups of coffee per day were less likely to have calcium deposits than those who drank more or less.
“While this study does highlight a potential link between coffee consumption and lower risk of developing clogged arteries, more research is needed to confirm these findings and understand what the reason is for the association,” Victoria Taylor of the British Heart Foundation told the BBC. “We need to take care when generalizing these results because it is based on the South Korean population, who have different diet and lifestyle habits to people in the UK.”
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