Saturday, May 12, 2012

MORE ON NUTRICEUTICALS. COFFEE VERSUS STROKES

At the recently concluded European Society of Hypertension Annual Scientific meeting held in London, Dr Lanfranco D'Elia ( Naples, Italy ), presented a meta-analysis on coffee consumption and risk of strokes. Their group studied 11 study cohorts with 484,757 patients under study. Most of the studies included were performed in the late 2000s, including some very recent ones. The follow-up period was 2-24 years. These were general population people presumably with no heart disease. they divided coffee drinkers into 3 groups, the moderate consumption group ( 1-3 cuppa day ), the high consumption group ( 3-6 cuppa day ) and the very high consumption group ( more than 6 cuppa day ). Over the study period, there were 7,272 strokes. All groups showed a decline in stroke rate, the most in the moderate consumption group. This decline in stroke rates in the moderate consumption group reached statistical significance. The decline in stroke rates in the other two groups did not reach statistical significance, but tending towards.
I suppose it is safe to say that with this meta-analysis in a very large cohort, drinking coffee for the general population does not increase stroke rates, and if you do so moderately, it may infact protect you from strokes.. This is nice to know. Please note that the studies did not specify the type of coffee.
So from the ESH ,meeting in London 2012, we know that Grana Padano cheese and coffee may be good for us in terms of BP lowering and also stroke protection.

 So I went shopping at Cold Storage, Subang Parade, and found the grana padano cheese. It is a hard cheese, goes well with a bit of red wine ( need not be Italian ). A bit pricey.

1 comment:

YIP YIN FUN said...

Good cheese can be quite unaffordable for most Malaysian. What more a sound quality of cuppa....