In the news: Coffee May Lower Heart Failure Risk; Oily Fish and Type 2 Diabetes

Coffee May Lower Risk for Heart Failure

There’s good news for those who love coffee. A newly published study reports that drinking at least one or more cups of caffeinated (but not decaffeinated) coffee daily is associated with a lower risk of developing heart failure(1), a common condition in older individuals. Heart failure affects over 6 million Americans, with an estimated 960,000 new cases diagnosed each year.

Using a type of artificial intelligence (a machine learning model from the American Heart Association) as a method to analyze data, researchers looked at coffee consumption and heart failure in three large, well-known studies that included more than 21,000 participants who were followed for at least a decade. The studies included the Framingham Heart Study, Cardiovascular Health Study, and the Atherosclerosis Risk in Communities Study.

Across all 3 of these population studies, people who drank more coffee had a lower long-term risk of heart failure.

In the Atherosclerosis Risk in Communities Study, there appeared to be about a 30% reduction in risk with the consumption of at least 2 or more cups daily versus no coffee consumption3. Among those in the Framingham and Cardiovascular Health studies, the risk of heart failure fell by 5%-12% per cup of coffee per day, compared to people who drank none3.

Using machine learning to analyze data (the method used in this study) is a new and promising tool for nutrition research. The benefit of this approach.is that it can steer researchers toward the strongest risk factors to examine. In this case, coffee ranked in importance alongside age, blood pressure, heart rate and weight for their associations with heart failure(2,3).

Some people are sensitive to caffeine, linking its intake to heart palpitations. Drinking too much caffeine may also cause jitteriness and sleep problems. But for most people, a link between 2 cups of java daily and a reduced risk for heart failure is welcome news.

Oily Fish May Be an Ally in Preventing Type 2

Cold water, oily fish are those that contain a good amount of omega-3 fatty acids. Examples include sardines, herring and anchovies among the smaller fish, as well as salmon, trout, mackerel, tuna and swordfish.

Eating oil-rich fish (but not non-oily fish) is tied to a lower risk for developing type 2 diabetes, according to a newly published study(4).

Researchers used information from over 390,000 middle-aged and older people residing in the United Kingdom (participants in the UK Biobank) to evaluate the association between oil and non-oily fish consumption and type 2 diabetes – the largest study to date to examine the fish-diabetes link.

Participants who ate either 1, or 2 or more oily fish servings per week had a lower risk – 22% lower – of type 2 diabetes compared to those who ate none. No significant link was observed for non-oil fish consumption.

A significant 9% lower incidence of type 2 was seen for those who reported regularly taking a fish oil supplement vs non-users at the study's start, and an 18% reduced risk for those reporting fish oil use during the study.

The authors recommend fresh oily fish rather than fish oil supplements but note that fish oil may be an alternative for those who can’t add these fish to their diet.

References

1. Stevens LM, et al. Association between coffee intake and incident heart failure risk. Circ Heart Fail. 14:e006799, 2021.
2. Vest AR. Editorial: Can two coffees a day keep the heart doctor away? Circ Heart Fail. 14:e008297, 2021.
3. American Heart Association News, Feb. 9, 2021. https://www.heart.org/en/news/2021/02/09/coffee-may-help-reduce-risk-for-heart-failure Chen G-C, et al. Association
4. Chen G-C, et al. Association of oily and non-oily fish consumption and fish oil supplements with incident type 2 Diabetes: A Large Population-Based Prospective Study. Diabetes Care. Epub Jan. 11, 2021.