 |
| Dunkin Donuts coffee for health! |
Being a HUGE Dunkin' Donuts coffee drinker (and scientist) that I (Rob) am, I LOVE when coffee and science come together and prove great things about coffee. :) Here's one such study from Japan.
Drink up!!
In the News: Coffee as medicine? Japanese scientists show how it helps the heart
Source: Los Angeles Times:
LATimes Article Nov 24, 2013
A study presented last week (week of Nov. 17, 2013) at the
American Heart Assn.’s
Scientific Sessions meeting offers new evidence that coffee boosts the function of small blood vessels in people who are already healthy.
Researchers in Japan recruited 27 young adults in their 20s to
participate in the study. None of them were regular coffee drinkers, but
they agreed to consume two 5-ounce cups of joe for the sake of science.
On one of the days, the
coffee was caffeinated. On the other day, they drank decaf. They weren’t
told which was which. Neither were the researchers, who measured the
volunteers’
blood pressure and blood flow after they finished their beverages.
 |
| All the medicine you need |
The researchers placed a probe on the tip of each volunteer’s left
index finger or thumb and used a technique called laser Doppler
flowmetry to measure blood flow to the digit. It works by shining a
laser beam through the blood and measuring how much it is scattered by
the movement of red blood cells.
For the study, the researchers interrupted blood flow to the hand for
one minute, Dr. Masato Tsutsui, the cardiologist who led the study,
said in an email to The Times. When the minute was up, they monitored
how quickly the normal blood returned to the finger or thumb.
]
It turned out that blood flow measured in the finger or thumb was 30%
higher on the day they had regular coffee than on the day they had
decaf. This was significant because the measurements are a proxy for how
well the small blood vessels in the body are working.
That wasn’t the only change. Blood pressure rose “significantly” as
well on the days the volunteers drank regular coffee, according to the
study abstract. But the caffeine didn’t cause the volunteers’ hearts to beat more quickly.
The researchers also measured levels of the neurotransmitters
epinephrine
(also known as adrenaline) and norepinephrine in the volunteers’ blood
plasma. The levels were essentially the same after drinking both types
of coffee.
“This gives us a clue about how coffee may help improve
cardiovascular health,” Tsutsui said in a statement from the American
Heart Assn. Tsutsui is a professor of pharmacology at the University of
the Ryukyus in Okinawa, Japan.
If scientists can figure out how caffeinated coffee helps small blood
vessels work better, “it could lead to a new treatment strategy for
cardiovascular disease in the future,” he said.
But this is probably not the only reason why many studies have linked
coffee consumption with better cardiovascular health, he said via email.
Instead, he said, it’s “just one of many.”
HEAD TO DUNKIN'' DONUTS NOW TO IMPROVE YOUR HEALTH AND DRINK UP! :)
