By Howard Bryman
New research funded by the National Cancer Institute has reinforced a positive association between coffee consumption and the longevity of people diagnosed with colon cancer. The findings, published this month in the peer-reviewed American Medical Association journal JAMA Oncology, indicate that greater coffee consumption corresponds with a reduced risk of the cancer worsening.
The research was based on an observational study of 1,171 patients with advanced or metastatic colorectal cancer. Patients provided a record of daily food intake using a semi-quantitative questionnaire at the time of enrollment, contributing to data collected from October 2005 through January 2018.
Analysis of this data revealed that the more coffee a person reported consuming at the time of enrollment, the lower their risk of disease progression and death. People who reported drinking four or more cups a day exhibited a 36% better chance of survival overall and a 22% better chance of continuing on without their cancer worsening. This association manifested notably for both regular and decaffeinated coffee.
The conclusions are very much in line with those of previous studies, including one published by the American Association for Cancer Research in the April 2016 issue of the journal Cancer Epidemiology, Biomarkers & Prevention. Investigating the association between coffee consumption and colorectal cancer risk in 5,145 cases and 4,097 controls from a case-control study in northern Israel, researchers found 26% lower odds of developing colorectal cancer among people who drink coffee as opposed to people who don't; that increasing consumption was associated with lower odds of developing colorectal cancer; and that the phenomenon was true for decaf, as well.
The authors of both studies noted that while the health risks of drinking coffee are low, additional research is still required before recommending coffee consumption as an actual treatment for the reduction or prevention of colorectal cancer.
“Although it is premature to recommend a high intake of coffee as a potential treatment for colorectal cancer, our study suggests that drinking coffee is not harmful and may potentially be beneficial,” medical oncologist Dr. Kimmie Ng of the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, a senior author of the study, said in an announcement of the findings.
The new study also adds to the growing body of evidence supporting coffee consumption as potentially beneficial in the fight against a wide variety of ailments. In the past 10 years, studies from a multitude of respected institutions have linked coffee consumption to lower risks of liver cancer, Alzheimer’s, oral cancer, heart failure, all-cause mortality, and suicide, among other things.