Another Study Points to Reduced Stroke Risk for Women Coffee Drinkers

Tue, Aug 18, 15 by Jim Couch

A new Swedish study regarding stroke risk and coffee consumption comes to the same basic conclusion as earlier studies — women can expect less stroke risk if they regularly drink coffee.

In a study published March 10 in Stroke: Journal of the American Heart Association, researchers determined that women who consumed one or more cups of coffee per day had about a 25% lower risk of stroke than women who drank less than that.

Researchers at the National Institute of Environmental Science in Stockholm, Sweden followed 34,670 women aged 49 to 83 over a 10 year period from 1997 to 2007.  The researchers determined that among that group, women who regularly drank coffee were at lower risk for stroke, cerebral infarction and subarachnoid hemorrhage than non-coffee drinkers.  The study did not differentiate between caffeinated and decaffeinated coffee, although apparently decaf consumption if fairly low in Sweden.

The study out of Sweden came to the same conclusion as a study reported in 2010 from the University of Cambridge in England which found men and women coffee drinkers were only 71% as likely to have a stroke as non-coffee drinkers; and a 2009 Nurses Health Study which showed 20% less stroke for women drinking four or more cups a day.

Stroke is the leading cause of serious, long-term disabiity in the U.S., and the third cause of death following heart disease and cancer.

A good anti-stroke regimen might be:  stay away from tobacco, maintain a reasonable weight, and keep drinking that coffee!