Drinking coffee helps hepatitis C treatment
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By David Liu, Ph.D.
Drinking coffee may help treat hepatitis C, according to a new study.
Freedman N. D. of the National Institutes of Health in Rockville, Maryland and colleagues reported in the June 2011 issue of Gastroenterology that drinking three or more cups of coffee per day helped hepatitis c treatment.
Early epidemiologic studies have found high coffee consumption associated with reduced risk of liver cancer or hepatocelluar carcinoma. But the researchers wanted to know how drinking coffee may affect outcomes of hepatitis C treatment.
Freedman et al. recruited 885 patients for the Hepatitis C Antiviral Long-Term Treatment Against Cirrhosis Trial. All patients were surveyed for their coffee consumption at baseline or prior to treatment with peginterferon and ribavirin. After the start of the treatment, patients were monitored for their virologic response at week 12, 20 and 72.
At week 20, non-coffee drinkers experienced an average 2 log10 reduction in the viral load while those who drank 3 or more cups of coffee a day had a 4-log10 reduction.
After adjustment for other factors, those who drank three or more cups of coffee per day, compared to those who did not drink, were 100, 110 and 140 percent more likely to have a 2-log10 reduction in the viral load at week 12, 20 and at the end of treatment, respectively.
Additionally, those who drank three or more cups of coffee were 80 percent more likely to sustained the virologic response, compared to those who did not drink coffee.
The researchers concluded "High-level consumption of coffee (more than 3 cups per day) is an independent predictor of improved virologic response to peginterferon plus ribavirin in patients with hepatitis C."
An estimated 1.5 percent of the U.S. population is infected with hepatitis C virus, which is hard to treat and can lead to severe complications such as liver cancer.
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