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Will Caffeine Cause Health Problems?
numbski asks: "We're all geeks here, and I think there is no question how much we love our caffeine. What concerns me is that my fiancee has noticed how much I take in during the morning, and that I even use Diet Pepsi in addition to pain killers as a medication for headaches. So I did my googling about caffeine and addiction. In the minority, you have one report making a scientific claim that there is no such thing as an addiction to caffeine, however many other articles (not to mention marketing propaganda) suggest otherwise. Perhaps not just the sake of having an addiction is what concerns me, but whatever other side effects. I generally take good care of myself, go to the gym, exercise, play hockey, eat right. I hate to have a stroke or heart attack later on in life because of the stuff. I'd be curious to know the thoughts of others who take in large amounts of caffeine, and perhaps what their doctors have said about it. I plan on talking to my own soon, but it seems like this warrants discussion amongst those who consume the most. Would/does this prevent you from grabbing your Bawls and running like hell?"
As a matter of fact, when I don't drink it, I have these POUNDING HEADACHES LIKE A NAIL IN MY BRAIN.
Therefore, it must be good for me, right?
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BAWLS Guarana, www.bawls.com, is a high caffeine soft drink made from the guarana berry from the Amazonian Rainforest. The caffeine derived from guarana is twice as powerful as the caffeine derived from coffee.
I thought caffeine was caffeine was caffeine was a single molecule. How can a molecule from one source be "twice as powerful" as the same molecule from another source?
Or maybe I've just had too much coffee, and now I'm all paranoid.
Short answer NO. Long answer anything in excess can cause health problems, including water.
People seem to have a moral problem with a drug that has no side effects, but let's face it, from the scientific literature it seems caffeine is it.
It is midly addictive, in the sense that you crave it, but getting rid of the addiction is generally very easy if you use the fade out method (gradually reduce your consumption of caffeine over a period of several weeks).
... and it seems like caffeine might actually prevent Alzheimers.
People couldn't type. We realized: Death would eventually take care of this.
She said one study " reported dependence over a wide dose range", from as little as one or two cups per day to as much as 25 cups.
25 cups???? 8 hour workday. 25/8=~3/hour
Every 20 minutes you're downing approximately 8oz of caffeine and water.
Man, come up for air!
Karma: Chameleon (mostly due to the fact that you come and go).
Here is a snippet about sleep and addiction
The most important long-term problem is the effect that caffeine has on sleep.The half-life of caffeine in your body is about 6 hours. That means that if you consume a big cup of coffee with 200 mg of caffeine in it at 3:00 PM, by 9:00 PM about 100 mg of that caffeine is still in your system. You may be able to fall asleep, but your body probably will miss out on the benefits of deep sleep. That deficit adds up fast. The next day you feel worse, so you need caffeine as soon as you get out of bed. The cycle continues day after day. This is why 90% of Americans consume caffeine every day. Once you get in the cycle, you have to keep taking the drug. Even worse, if you try to stop taking caffeine, you get very tired and depressed and you get a terrible, splitting headache as blood vessels in the brain dilate. These negative effects force you to run back to caffeine even if you want to stop.
I read this book over a year ago, and it caused me to go caffeine free for the better part of a year. Since then, I've taken the road of moderation, as I do love a good cup of coffee once in a while, as well as a good iced-tea. However, I've ditched carbonated beverages for good.
The book includes over 700 references, and while I'm not medical-minded enough to call him on his conclusions, they make sense to me and follow-up internet research of my own suggests that he's in the ballpark.
In my view, there's not much of anything the body can't handle in modest amounts once in a while: caffeine, alcohol, and even some recreational drugs. But chronic usage of any substance in large amounts can't be that good for you -- that just seems like common sense (if not outright supported by the sciences). If we all consumed alcohol as much as we did caffeine, our livers would turn to mush.
If nothing else, this book has some great coffee alternatives listed at the end.
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I am a academic clinical psychologist. I do not specialize in caffeine per se in any way, academically or clinically, but I can tell you what I know.
(1) Caffeine is not addictive in the true sense of addictive. That is, it does not lead to abnormal cravings or pathological activation of neural approach systems per se. However, it does induce withdrawal, in the sense that your body develops a tolerance to it to maintain a certain equilibrium. When you remove the caffeine, you get headaches because you're not providing the chemicals your body expects. So, it's not addictive, but it does lead to tolerance. I'm not sure if I'm explaining that well, but that's what's going on.
(2) Caffeine is known to increase levels of anxiety in various individuals. Some individuals, in fact, have acute, severe anxiety reactions to caffeine. I believe there is actually a relatively recent paper identifying the particular gene involved in this acute reaction. My guess is that you don't suffer from this, as most people who have this reaction become aware of it. But not all. And in any event, many individuals' levels of anxiety are increased by caffeine even if they don't have acute reactions. So, if you're worried about your anxiety or stress (meta-anxiety?), you might want to think about cutting caffeine and seeing if it helps. I do know various people who have stopped taking caffeinated substances and said they're much mellower and calmer people. I also know people who have starting using caffeine again after stopping it, and have commented on how much more anxious they feel. But for others, it doesn't seem to matter. You'll have to find out for yourself.
(3)As someone pointed out, caffeine habits can effect people's sleep. I once heard a rule of thumb that you shouldn't be drinking caffeinated beverages after 8:00 or so if you want to get adequate sleep. It seemed to help me; you could try it and see for yourself. Sleep problems are associated with all sorts of other issues, so even if caffeine doesn't have adverse effects directly, it may have such effects indirectly through sleep problems. But it should be okay as long as you are exposed to caffeine at appropriate times of day.
So that's what I know from that perspective. In terms of long-term physical outcomes, I don't know really. I haven't heard of such things, but I haven't paid that much attention those sorts of issues anyway.
Back in '88 I was a senior in high school. I would consume Mountain Dew x 2 in the morning to wake up. I'd have various caffinated beverages throughout the day. After work at night to stay awake for homework I'd be using Vivarin chased with as much of a 6-pack of Jolt Cola as I could stomach. Then unisom when I was done to get to sleep. Better living through chemistry I said!
It took a little while for the heart palpatations to start. I didn't like those but I was a stupid kid then. I just cut back a bit on the Jolt, but not much.
It took until early in my first year in college for the real physical effects to develop -- incredible abdominal cramps that would lay me compeltely out ina whimpering crying ball on the floor. Think appendix + gall bladder + birth. It took me a little while to start to correlate it to caffeine, but I told the doctors everything.
After ramming a wonderful camera up my tail and submitting me to a string of other humiliating tests (complete with barium enemas -- can you say "shitting rocks for 3 days?") the doctors told me that essentially I would never be able to have caffeine again without side effects because of the damage it did to my bowels & intestinal tract. I was now caffeine intolerant.
There was a drug I could take if I really didn't want the incredible abdominal cramps but it gave me nightmares. I actually tried it and the night terrors weren't worth some caffeine.
It took me 2 weeks worth of pretty nasty withdrawl symptoms before I got over it.
I have now been clean about 14 years. Nothing with caffeine, no cola, no chocolate, nothing. I read ingredients lists religiously looking for anything with more than 5gm of caffeine. A cup of Swiss Miss Hot Cocoa (5mg) gives me a pretty good buzz and I can't tolerate two of them without some mild pain.
Yes, it is a drug. Yes, it is addictive. Yes, you go through withdrawl, and yes, you can live without it. I don't know ho wmany 36 hour days I've done on sugar and micro power naps alone.
Time is the quality of nature that keeps events from happening all at once. Lately it doesn't seem to be working. -Anon
If you want medical advice, don't ask Slashdot. Ask your doctor.
Balzac is said to have died from a heart problem induced by his love for coffee. The man was an addict. See his "The Pleasures and Pains of Coffee". Of course, one also note that the guy wrote well over a hundred novels during his career so it might have been a good trade -- depends on where your priorities are. I always thought Balzac should be the patron saint of geeks and programmers.
I say this as an M.D. who relies on a pot of coffe to get going in the morning, and 2-3 20 oz cokes and/or a vente starbucks in the afternoon:
coffee has several known effects on an organism's health:
coffee's effect on wakefulness is likely mediated by interfering with adenosine receptors in the frontal lobes of the brain (competitive antagonism). although I personally feel that coffee makes me more alert and attentive, there is always the possibility that this is a fabrication of my own self-perception. which is to say: i do not know of an objective way of supporting the statement "coffee enhances my mental functioning despite being sleep deprived."
antagonism of adenosine receptors in the heart leads to an increased tendency for the cardiac muscle to contract spontaneously. this leads to an extra contraction known as a PVC (premature ventricular contraction). i do not know what the health implications of this are. common sense would suggest that there is little consequence to this unless you have a very sick heart to begin with.
caffiene is a weak diuretic (it makes you pee). this can promote the formation of kidney stones in some people. it can also dehydrate you, which is why you should never hit the StarBucks just before you cross Death Valley by foot.
caffiene both increases acid production in the stomach and weakens the tone of the sphincter (valve) between the esophagus and the stomach. this results in gastroesophageal reflux (heart burn). gastroesophageal reflux, if severe, can lead to esophagitis, Barrett's esophagus (metaplasia, e.g. precancerous change), and adenocarcionoma (cancer) of the esophagus. i don't know of any studies that show an increased risk of developing esophageal cancer in coffee drinkers, but such a study would be retrospective and probably very difficult to pull off with sufficient power.
Lastly, and I know this is kinda weak: people who drink X number of cups of coffee each day _may_ have an increased chance of developing bladder cancer.
all in all, though, coffee is a pretty benign habit. in a public health sense, it pales in comparison to simple things, like limiting saturated fats, not smoking, moderate alcohol intake, and wearing seat belts.
Fermat's other theorem: "I have a simple proof, but I can't write it down as I fear it's a DMCA violation to discuss it"
Coffee makes us speedy, irritable, sleepless, and often causes heartburn or ulcers. The removal of caffeine is supposed to reduce some of these undesirable effects. Coffee is an addicting beverage. If you consume more than 2 cups per day, you are likely to experience unpleasant withdrawal if you stop. The minimal suffering includes a headache, irritability, and fatigue. The popular ideas that the bad effects of coffee are caused by one chemical, caffeine, is misleading. The 800 or so other chemicals in coffee include aromatic or phenolic chemicals and many are probably neurotoxic; other chemicals are allergenic. Coffee is also a crop with pesticide residues. Coffee can be allergenic and makes some people obviously sick. Chlorogenic acid is one of the allergens which coffee shares with oranges.
Tea and coffee have much in common, although they different plant products from different geographic zones. Tea contains caffeine and other members of the drug family, methyxanthines. Tea also contains tannin, a good tanning agent. The caffeine dose in a cup of coffee ranges from 100 to 160 mg. A cup of tea has 20-60 mg and 12 ounces of regular Coca Cola has 45 mg of caffeine. The symptom complex produced by tea parallels coffee. Chronic heavy tea- users have sometimes been nicknamed Tuffers. Teas are addicting and are allergenic.
Daily coffee or tea ingestion induces a 24 hour cyclic disturbance with morning arousal, irritability, difficulty concentrating, subtle levels of disorganization, clumsiness, and forgetfulness. As the day progresses, 2 or more cups later, a heavy fatigue sets in by mid to late afternoon. Further coffee doses may rouse one a bit, but then further collapse is inevitable by evening. Irritability may evolve into disproportionate or inappropriate angry outbursts, pleasure-loss, absence of good-feelings, or empathy anesthesia. It is likely that the subtle pyschopathology of moderate to heavy coffee consumption contributes to the production of unnecessary conflict and dysphoria. The subtle cognitive and memory deficits which appear after coffee intake should alarm employers who expect their employees to think, remember, or carry out skilled, coordinated acts. It may be that coffee and tea intake facilitates dull, routine, rote tasks where thinking, skill, and initiative are unimportant. The cognitive and emotional defects of the coffee-drinker should also alarm a spouse or close family member who cannot understand why the relationship is not working. Until you consider coffee and other food-factors, mental and emotional disturbances may be totally mystifiying. Early sleep may be denied the infrequent coffee user. The chronic coffee-used may go to sleep readily but sleeps poorly and awakens feeling tired and mentally clouded. Morning fatigue demands more coffee to get going. A familiar recursive loop is established following the familiar addictive sequence.
If you begin in a clear state with no symptoms and a clear mind, the ingestion of even one cup of coffee will often produce a marked and undesirable effect. The sustained ingestion of even small amounts of coffee seems to produce a subtle psychopathology. The chronic coffee user risks a variety of physical and mental disabilities, especially coffee-user-fog. If your Cuffer spouse, employer, employee, or best friend seems irritable, obtuse, unduly nasty, or depressed, nurse them through the three-day- withdrawal headache and serve nice cups of hot water instead. Coffee substitutes are definitely not recommended. Many ex-cuffers find that a "nice cup of hot water" becomes a suitable drink. Others switch to light consume, soup, or hot water, lightly flavored with lemon and honey.
During my first year of college, I drank a lot of caffeine, mostly from Mt. Dew. I was drinking probably 6 or 7 12oz cans a day.
During the 2nd half of the year I started noticing that about once a day for 2 to 3 seconds my whole body (and especially my heart) would feel like I was running in super hyper mode. It felt like everything in my body was just running super fast. I didn't know what to think of it, but it only happened once a day for a couple of seconds so like an idiot I just didn't worry about it.
Over the next couple of weeks the incidents started becoming more and more frequent until I was having one of these 2-3 second super-hyper feeling spurts once every 10-15 minutes. At this point I got scared and headed straight for the local night clinic.
When I got there they took my pulse, blood pressure, etc and hooked me up to the EKG thing and had me just hang out there and lay around for 20 minutes or so. As bad luck would have it, I didn't have a single occurrence of the weirdness while I was hooked up. After a while, they unhooked me and were getting ready to send me home, but the nurse decided to go ahead and check my pulse and blood pressure one more time.
While she was checking my pulse, I had one of the weird speed up feelings. I didn't even have to tell her. As soon as it happened she looked up at me and said "It just happened, didn't it!" and I was like "Yes, how did you know?!?! What did you feel?!?!". She had actually felt my heart skip an entire beat while she was taking my pulse!
The doctor came back in and when she gave him this new information he said "Do you drink a lot of caffeine?" I didn't even know what was considered a lot or which drinks had a lot, so I was like "I drink a lot of mountain dew, I think those have caffeine". When he asked me how many and I told him 6 or 7 a day he told me that was my problem. The feeling I had been having was kind of an adrenaline rush where the rest of my body was trying to get my heart started back up again.
I immediately stopped drinking caffeine and it took about 2 weeks for the problem to completely go away. It tapered off at about the same rate it had built up in the first place.
At the time this happened I was in really good shape. It had been less than a year since I was a 2 sport athlete in high school and my fitness level was still pretty high.
So, caffeine may not have negative effects on everyone, but I'm pretty sure I could have killed myself on it if I had kept drinking it at the rate I had been.