Coffee To Fight Skin Cancer?

Nonmelanoma Skin Cancer May Be Rarer In Some Women Who Drink Coffee With Caffeine

(WebMD)  America's most common cancer may be rarer among postmenopausal women who drink coffee.

The researchers who report that news are talking about nonmelanoma skin cancer.

The National Cancer Institute estimates that there will be more than a million new cases and fewer than 2,000 deaths from nonmelanoma skin cancer in the U.S. in 2007.

Wayne State University's Ernest Abel, Ph.D., and colleagues studied coffee consumption and nonmelanoma skin cancer in more than 77,000 white postmenopausal women in the U.S.

The women participated in a long-term observational health study that began in the 1990s.

When the women joined the study, they shared lots of information about themselves, including how much coffee (decaf or caffeinated) and tea they drank and whether they had ever been diagnosed with nonmelanoma skin cancer.

Skin Cancer and Coffee

A total of 7,482 women reported ever having nonmelanoma skin cancer.

The researchers considered factors including participants' smoking , drinking, age, BMI (body mass index , which relates height to weight), and whether the women lived in the sunny South or further north when the study started.

After those adjustments, the researchers found that each daily cup of caffeinated coffee was associated with a 5% drop in the women's odds of reporting nonmelanoma skin cancer.

Women who drank six cups of caffeinated coffee per day were 30% less likely than other women to report nonmelanoma skin cancer.

Decaffeinated coffee and tea weren't linked to the women's odds of reporting nonmelanoma skin cancer.

Study's Limits

Like other observational studies, this one doesn't prove cause and effect. That is, the researchers didn't test coffee to see if it prevents skin cancer.

Abel and colleagues didn't have data on which women wore sunscreen or whether the women drank more or less coffee over the years.

Also, the findings only show which women reported nonmelanoma skin cancer at the study's start. So it's not clear who developed nonmelanoma skin cancer later.

Abel's team calls for long-term studies to track the relationship between coffee and nonmelanoma skin cancer over time.

Their findings appear in the European Journal of Cancer Research.

In July, other researchers reported that the combination of caffeine and exercise may help fight skin cancer . But Abel's team found that physical activity didn't cut skin cancer risk, perhaps due to sun exposure during outdoor activities.

[rushman71]

markpeters5: Sounds like you believe in all the teachings of the KKK!!! Get real and grow up!!!

[markpeters5]

My neighbor''s daughter recently died of the melanoma caused by black people, the African American Incidental (UV) Transference (AAIT). Our whole community is alarmed now. I spoke to my dermatologist who told me AAIT is a real threat. I''m now following all the best practices i.e. applying additional sun screen to open areas of my body before being in close contact with them, avoiding shaking hands and wiping off my work keyboard after one of them uses it.

[gaye5]

Well, up until recently I didn''t drink coffee at all, and although we live in Australia, I at 62 don''t have any skin cancers at all, even though both my parents did and my husband who does drink coffee also does....

[jerr11]

After the Bush neocon whitehouse, drug companies are the biggest scams in the country.

So when am I getting a drug fix for my RFS (restless fingers syndrome)!

LOL

[horse3farm]

This is what cancer funds go towards...stupid studies that don''t prove a thing.

There will never be a cure for cancer..because hundreds of thousands of people would be out of a job...plain and simple...this too is all about money.

[jerr11]

Looks like Starbucks is paying for all these "studies"!

Just like all how all those statin drug companies paid for their cholesterol studies!

[shanev137]

Sounds like they''re guessing again. I the past 10 years there have been hundreds of conflicting reports on how good coffee is for you. Jumping up and down on one leg 3 times a day "may" reduce cancer too. Who knows. You''d think with the technology and the hundreds of billions spent on cancer research during the last 100 years we''d have a cure for cancer already.