Enjoying a daily cup of tea or coffee can 'keep you stronger in old age'
A daily cup of tea or coffee can keep you stronger in old age, a new study claims.
Researchers say that drinking coffee and tea at midlife may be associated with a reduced likelihood of physical frailty in late life. Caffeine is the key and those who drank four cups of coffee a day did best, though those who drank black and green tea also benefitted.
The team from the National Universty of Singapore looked at 12,000 participants, aged 45 to 74 years old, with a follow-up period of 20 years. Professor Koh Woon Puay, of the Healthy Longevity Translational Research Programme at the Yong Loo Lin School of Medicine at the University, said: "Coffee and tea are mainstay beverages in many societies around the world, including Singapore. Our studies show that consumption of these caffeinated drinks at midlife may be associated with a reduced likelihood of physical frailty in late life.
"However, further studies are still needed to confirm these longitudinal associations, and to investigate if these effects on physical frailty are mediated by caffeine or other chemical compounds." Participants were interviewed for the first time at midlife, at average age of 53 years, and asked about their habit of drinking caffeine-containing beverages such as coffee, tea and soft drinks and food such as chocolate in terms of frequency and portion size.
The participants, who were on average 73 years old, were asked about their weight and if they felt full of energy. They also had their handgrip strength tested and completed the timed up-and-go (TUG) test. Physical frailty was defined as having at least two of the four components of weight loss, exhaustion, slowness and weakness. Coffee and tea made up 84 per cent and 12 per cent of total caffeine in the group.
Surprising symptom that 40% of women suffer weeks before a heart attack
Over two thirds (68.5 per cent) drank coffee daily. In this group, 52.9 per cent of them drank one cup a day, 42.2 per cent consumed two to three cups per day while the remaining 4.9 per cent drank four or more cups per day. Tea drinkers were split into four categories based on how often they drank: never, at least once a month, at least once a week, and daily drinkers.
The results showed that drinking coffee, black tea or green tea in middle age was linked with a significantly lower chance of physical frailty in later life. Participants who drank four or more cups of coffee per day were much less likely to be physically frail in later life, compared to those who didn't drink coffee daily. Those who drank black tea or green tea daily also had a significantly lower chance of physical frailty, compared to those who didn't drink tea.
The study, published in the Journal of the American Medical Directors Association, concluded higher caffeine intake was associated with lower odds of physical frailty, regardless of the source of caffeine.
Amongst the four components of physical frailty, the associations were stronger for the measured tests of handgrip strength and TUG, getting out of a chair to a fixed point a few metres away, than for the self-reported measures of weight loss and exhaustion.
Other research has shown caffeine increases proliferation in muscle cells and improves muscle weight in mice. In addition to caffeine, coffee and tea also contain rich bioactive polyphenols, which possess antioxidant and anti-inflammatory properties, and have been associated with reduced risk for diseases that increase frailty, such as diabetes, cardiovascular diseases, obesity and neurodegenerative diseases.
However, further research is necessary to identify the actual ingredients and mechanisms underlying the association between coffee, tea and physical function in humans.
* An AI tool was used to add an extra layer to the editing process for this story. You can report any errors to [email protected]
Read more similar news:
Comments:
comments powered by Disqus
