Atrial Fibrillation Risk Not Linked to Caffeine

BASEL, SwitzerlandFormulators of energy drinks and weight loss supplements should be happy to hear Swiss researchers found, in a large cohort of initially healthy women, elevated caffeine consumption was not associated with an increased risk of incident atrial fibrillation (AF) (Am J Clin Nutr. 2010;92(3):509-514). The study consisted of 33,638 initially 45-year-old healthy women who participated in the Womens Health Study and were free of cardiovascular disease (CVD) and AF at baseline were prospectively followed from 1993 to 2009.   

During a median follow-up of 14.4 years, 945 AF events occurred. Median caffeine intakes across increasing quintiles of caffeine intake were 22, 135, 285, 402 and 656 mg/d, respectively. Age-adjusted incidence rates of AF across increasing quintiles of caffeine intake were 2.15, 1.89, 2.01, 2.24 and 2.04 events, respectively, per 1,000 person-years of follow-up. In Cox proportional hazards models updated in 2004 by using time-varying covariates, the corresponding multivariable-adjusted hazard ratios were 1.0, 0.88, 0.78, 0.96 and 0.89. None of the individual components of caffeine intake (coffee, tea, cola and chocolate) were significantly associated with incident AF. These data suggest that elevated caffeine consumption does not contribute to the increasing burden of AF in the population.