Tag Archives: caffeine

Coffee and Atrial Fibrillation – Update

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A couple of years ago I posted an article on this block entitled Does Drinking Coffee Cause Atrial Fibrillation?   

It had been determined that drinking coffee, even in fairly large amounts, did not increase the risk of an individual going into atrial fibrillation.

 

In their analysis, the researchers found that coffee consumption was not associated with AF incidence, even in more extreme levels of coffee consumption.

 

The article went on to state that while drinking coffee does not cause atrial fibrillation individuals who have no history of atrial fibrillation, it was thought that coffee may be related to recurrence of atrial fibrillation and individuals who have the arrhythmia intermittently:

 

“These findings indicate that coffee consumption does not cause atrial fibrillation,” Larsson says. “However, high coffee consumption may still trigger arrhythmia in patients who already have atrial fibrillation.”

 

 

It was stated that more research was necessary. 

A recent, widely reported Australian study, a very large review of existing studies, determined that coffee is likely safe for people with atrial fibrillation.

 

“Although coffee increases your heart rate, it does not make it abnormal,” explained senior researcher Dr. Peter Kistler.  . . . “We found that there is no detrimental effects of coffee on heart rhythm and, in fact, coffee at up to three cups per day may be protective,” he said.

 

Protective?  That sounds like terrific news!  It is always nice to find out that something that is so enjoyable, but which you have assumed is possibly unhealthy, turns out to be not only safe but good for you also, reducing, to a small extent, episodes of atrial  fibrillation.

 

 Kistler’s group found that, among more than 228,000 patients, drinking coffee cut the frequency of episodes of atrial fibrillation by 6 percent. A further analysis of nearly 116,000 patients found a 13 percent risk reduction.

One cup of coffee contains about 95 milligrams of caffeine and acts as a stimulant to the central nervous system.

Caffeine also blocks adenosine, a chemical that can trigger atrial fibrillation, Kistler explained.

 

This study did, however, go on to recommend that people with heart arrhythmias avoid caffeinated energy drinks.  Furthermore, people who are sensitive to caffeine, should still avoid coffee.  Again there are certain people who identify caffeine is a trigger for atrial fibrillation and those individual should, by no means, return to drinking coffee.

 

Please comment with respect to your experiences with coffee, energy drinks, and atrial fibrillation.  Thanks!

The original study can be found here:

 Peter Kistler, MBBS, Ph.D., director, electrophysiology, Alfred Hospital and Baker Heart and Diabetes Institute, Melbourne, Australia; Byron Lee, M.D., professor, medicine, director, electrophysiology laboratories and clinics, University of California, San Francisco; April 16, 2018, JACC: Clinical Electrophysiology

Does Drinking Coffee Cause Atrial Fibrillation?

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coffeebeans

It has often been said that drinking coffee is related to developing atrial fibrillation. How about people who already have a history of atrial fibrillation? Can coffee trigger an episode?

A recent large study from Sweden shows that coffee consumption does not increase the chance of developing atrial fibrillation, even if quite a bit of coffee is consumed.

So coffee does not cause atrial fibrillation; not in people who have no history of atrial fibrillation.

But what about people who already have a history of atrial fibrillation? Can coffee trigger recurrence of atrial fibrillation?

The answer to that is probably yes, but more research needs to be done. In this study it was found that people who already had atrial fibrillation tended to drink less coffee than people without atrial fibrillation – probably to prevent triggering the arrhythmia.

As for me, I’m in permanent atrial fibrillation and it really doesn’t make much difference – I drink my normal amount of coffee and don’t worry about it.

Here are some excerpts from an article, by Colleen Mullarkey, in Consultant360:
coffeecan

After analyzing data from nearly 250,000 individuals, researchers found no association between coffee consumption and an increased risk of AF, according to the findings in BMC Medicine.

“This is the largest study to date on coffee consumption in relation to risk of atrial fibrillation,” says lead study author Susanna C. Larsson, PhD, associate professor in the Institute of Environmental Medicine at Karolinska Institutet in Stockholm, Sweden.

Larsson and her colleagues investigated the association between coffee consumption and incidence of AF in two prospective cohorts who had provided information on coffee consumption in 1997 and were followed up for 12 years—41,881 men in the Cohort of Swedish Men and 34,594 women in the Swedish Mammography Cohort.

Using the Swedish Hospital Discharge, they identified 4,311 and 2,730 incident AF cases in men and women, respectively, in the two cohorts. The median daily coffee consumption was 3 cups among both men and women.

In their analysis, the researchers found that coffee consumption was not associated with AF incidence, even in more extreme levels of coffee consumption.

They confirmed this lack of association in a follow-up meta-analysis that included both of these two cohorts along with four other prospective studies, which amounted to a total of 10,406 cases of AF diagnosed among 248,910 individuals.

“These findings indicate that coffee consumption does not cause atrial fibrillation,” Larsson says. “However, high coffee consumption may still trigger arrhythmia in patients who already have atrial fibrillation.”

While the researchers could not examine this possibility in the present study, they observed that participants who had AF at the time they completed the questionnaire about their coffee consumption drank, on average, less coffee (mean of 2 cups/day) than those who did not have atrial fibrillation (mean of 3 cups/day).

Data in the study suggests that some individuals who had AF at the start of the study may have quit drinking coffee or cut down their consumption because of an arrhythmic-triggering effect.

“Further study is needed to assess whether coffee consumption may trigger arrhythmia in patients with atrial fibrillation,” Larsson says.

Larsson SC, Drca N, Jensen-Urstad M, Wolk A. Coffee consumption is not associated with increased risk of atrial fibrillation: results from two prospective cohorts and a meta-analysis. BMC Med. 2015 Sep 23;13(1):207.

Now the next question: Does running really ruin your knees? (Ha ha)