Caffeine's effect on mental alertness

                Caffeine is by far one of the most wildly used psychoactive substances today. For many people their daily lives somehow revolve around the consumption of caffeine, whether it is a cup of coffee in the morning or an energy drink for a mid-day energy boost.  A group of researchers recently set out to study the caffeine’s effect of mental alertness and performance.  They would then also see how the effects of caffeine withdrawal would affect individuals. 

                The population for the study was 369 people who had shown evidence that they were regular caffeine users.  The age range for the participants was between eighteen and sixty two years of age.  The participants were then categorized as either nonsmokers or light smokers.  Individuals were also categorized but the amount of caffeine they consumed by placing them into two categories of “non-low” and “medium-high”.  Participants were then administered a caffeine pill took take at nine thirty every morning.  They were told to abstain from caffeine use from seven pm onward until the next day.  After they received there caffeine pill participants were then given a series of test throughout the day to gauge there alertness and reaction time.

                The study saw that caffeine withdrawal was associated with detrimental effects in the morning.  Subjects experiencing caffeine withdrawal showed signs greater sleepiness, lowered alertness and poor reaction time during the morning tests.  Caffeine was shown to increase subjects functioning abilities and alertness in the “medium-high” group.  However these results were not seen in the “non-low” group.

source:
http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007%2Fs00213-012-2889-4/fulltext.html

Doping in Sport

            Doping for athletes is a well-known phenomenon that goes on in nearly all major sports today.  The article that I read focused on world-class athletes and their attitudes, beliefs and knowledge on the subject at matter. 

            Athletes say that most athletes start using performance-enhancing drugs for their own self-gain.  They use in hopes of improving their own performances, financial gain in their sport, and even better uses such as healing injuries quicker and to stop any nutritional deficiencies in their bodies.  Not all athletes use performance-enhancing drugs for the wrong reasons though.

            There was a large consensus among majority of athletes that doping in the sport was cheating.  They are also conscientious of the fact that it is a risky because of sanctions that may be placed on them or the fact that using for long periods of time can be unhealthy for the body with major consequences.

            The idea of beginning to start programs for the prevention of using these drugs has began to rise, but there is a huge lack in the amount and use of these programs by athletes.  Even with anti-drug use programs athletes still complain about the way testing is done for them and believe that punishments dealt out are not strict enough.

            Now, athletes are much more aware of the effects of these drugs, their uses and the consequences they may have.  I think with more research and athlete awareness the use of these drugs in sporting events will decrease over the years.  Players that use should have greater penalties placed upon them to give a lesson to others that may think about using also.

http://link.springer.com.ezaccess.libraries.psu.edu/article/10.1007%2Fs40279-013-0037-x

Side effects of HGH usage with children

This week I obtained an article regarding HGH use for children who need synthetic growth hormones for increased cell production due to bodily deficiencies that result in insufficient growth.  Recumbent HGH (rHGH) is used to treat such deficiencies but recent studies, such as this one, have been monitoring side effects of this treatment.  These side effects range from fevers and rash, which are normally temporary, to abnormalities with pubic growth.  These pubic growth problems are a result of the increased cell production that is caused from a synthetic growth aid.  This treatment can also have negative effects on kidneys, which go through long processes filtering rHGH from the body.

For individuals that experience organ damage and growth defects, the patients must undergo organ transplants or removal.  This surgery can affect the rest of the patients of the surgery lives by making these people more prone to disease and health problems.  Aside from these major problems, these people can also not partake in activities that are physically demanding on the body, like playing strenuous sports.  While organ transplants seem like such an easy solution to this problem, it is difficult to find people willing to donate these organs or obtain organs from donors that are in good shape.  Another side effect are changes in overall life mortality, which is why this treatment must be disclosed when applying for life insurance.  As an actuarial science major, I evaluate these health risks and calculate this into a policy by using a technique call age rating, which simply means a person who is 18 with a health defect applying for a policy will be treated as if they are an older age, such as 23 (hypothetical).

All in all, while rHGH is a good treatment for problems with growth in children, this treatment comes with many strings attached.  When considering this treatment for children, parents or guardians must weigh the potential side effects and evaluate other alternatives.  In the study conducted, they also found a range of other diseases that have an affiliated trend with rHGH treatment and make the issue multidimensional.

http://www.scielo.br/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S0004-27302011000800009&lng=en&nrm=iso&tlng=en

Health Risks of Energy Drinks

34.5 million users consume energy drinks. However, there are health concerns and work safety issues such as effects on mental and physical health. Energy drinks such as Red Bull and Monster are not considered food but rather as a dietary supplement. So they do not have the same safety regulations as food.

Health concerns for caffeine include nervousness, increased heart rate, toxicity, and poisoning. Routine use and abuse of caffeine can result in dependence and tolerance. The withdrawal could produce symptoms including headaches, fatigue and depression. Other effects include tooth erosion, psychiatric events, acute mania, strokes and death. Additionally, energy drinks can have an effect on the heart. “These effects include an increased heart rate, palpitations, chest pain, hypertension and arrhythmias, including ventricular and atrial fibrillation and ventricular tachycardia.”

Lately, people have been pairing caffeine with alcohol.  The extra caffeine provided by the energy drinks allows people to drink more alcohol at one time. This puts them at risk for alcohol poisoning and a lack of awareness of their level of impairment from the alcohol. This contributes to an increase of related risks such as injury, impaired driving, or sexual assault.

Caffeine causes pregnant women to experience extreme caffeine effects more than nonpregnant people. Studies of caffeine consumption in pregnant women have suggested contradictory result. “Some studies have suggested that caffeine may be associated with teratogenic effects, preterm birth, growth restriction and/or pregnancy loss.” Other studies have failed to replicate these findings.

In conclusion, as a result of increased consumption of energy drinks, people need to be more aware of the potential side effects of heavy caffeine consumption.

http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com.ezaccess.libraries.psu.edu/doi/10.1111/j.1751-486X.2012.01766.x/full

Effects of Caffeine on Exercise Performance and Metabolism

     In today's age where many people now take different supplements to help them with exercise performance, as well as recovery, I was curious as to how caffeine effects endurance performance, as well as how it would effect human metabolism while working out.

      The study I have found performed endurance tests on nine different competitive cyclists.  Two being female, and seven of them being male.  One endurance trial was conducted 60 minutes after the participants drank decaffeinated coffee.  A second trial was conducted 60 minutes after the participants consumed regular coffee containing 330 mg of caffeine.  The subjects were amazingly able to perform an average of 90.2 minutes of cycling after drinking caffeine, compared to only 75.5 minutes of cycling after only consuming the decaffeinated coffee.

     In terms of metabolism, evidence was found that a greater rate of lipid metabolism during the caffeine endurance trial compared to that of the trial without any caffeine.  However, carbohydrate metabolism seemed to remain consistent between both of the trials.

     So it seems that caffeine is able to help increase endurance during exercise by a fairly noticeable rate.  Also while doing so, it seems that caffeine can allow your body to metabolize more fat during a workout as well.  I wonder however if there other downfalls to taking caffeine with athletic performance, since I feel as if you don't hear all to often of athletes consuming caffeine before sporting events and such.


http://europepmc.org/abstract/MED/723503/reload=0;jsessionid=pHfYGUj8MGup4u9IkRUt.6

Biological Effects of Decaffeinated Coffee

A study conducted in Brazil about the effects of coffee and if decaffeinated coffee reduces any possible negative effects of coffee on the cardiovascular system.  Coffee's benefits are traced to the presence of phenols and a reduction in the risk of developing coronary artery disease.  However, caffeine consumption can raise the blood pressure and possibly make it unsafe to drink coffee for some parts of the population.

The researchers decided to take a look at the method of decaffeination , which is most popularly done using dichloromethane to leach out the caffeine.  They wanted to know if this method canceled out the benefits of drinking the coffee by introducing chlorogenic acids into the beverage and increasing the toxicity risk.  They decided to test this using lab rats and starting them out with caffeinated coffee and then after a week dividing them into groups and continuing some with caffeine, while giving others decaffeinated coffee and test the effects if any.

The tests administered on the rats measured their lipid profiles by determining their total cholesterol, HDL cholesterol and triglycedrides.  They used blood tests with enzymes to determine the composition of each.  They found that removing the caffeine from the coffee using whichever method needed, did not lead to a change in the lipid profile for the rats and had no platelet aggregation.  They said they kept in relatively common caffeine level in the coffee and kept to the most widely used decaffeination method, because of the coffees popularity around the world, and the fact that 10% of coffee drinkers consume decaffeinated.

Post #6: Caffeine and ADHD

This week I found an article discussing the effects of the caffeine in tea on Adult ADHD. WARNING: THIS IS ONLY A HYPOTHESIS AND HAS NOT BEEN TESTED. It is called Tea Consumption maybe an effective active treatment for adult attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and it was published in the Mental Health Center of West China Hospital at Sichuan University in Chengdu, PR China. Tea is a stimulant (because of its caffeine) that can increase people’s motivation, alertness, concentration, and cognitive performance. This report suggests that drinking tea may be an effective treatment for ADHD.

The report states that the biggest problem seen in adult patients is trouble organizing and completing necessary tasks related to either higher education or employment. Adult patients with ADHD have higher rates of car accidents and increased rates of divorce, and also a higher prevalence of anxiety, depression, drug abuse and antisocial behaviors than the general population. “1-36% of adults who met the criteria for ADHD as children will continue to manifest symptoms into adulthood.”

Usual treatment for ADHD involves medication and therapy. The most effective medications for ADHD are stimulants. Stimulants improve symptoms like short attention span, impulsiveness, and hyperactivity. A different study that is referenced in this study demonstrated that methylphenidate can be beneficial to certain aspects of driving. Because the chemistry of everybody’s body is different, it can be very difficult for find the correct drug, never mind the correct dose of a drug that causes the least amount of side effects. This leaves many adults still suffering.

It has been proven in many studies that caffeine has a positive effect on endurance and fatigue. “Caffeine improves mood and enhances psychomotor and cognitive performance in healthy volunteers, particularly on tasks measuring typing speed, simple reaction time, sustained attention, memory and logical reasoning, as well as simulated driving.” It is a known fact that ADHD is in large part caused by an energetic dysfunction. Stimulants help to regulate the arousal level in children with adhd. In a study done on rats with memory deficits, it was shown that caffeine prevents the deficits in memory performance. “The research indicated that caffeine in low dosage when added to methylphenidate was superior to all other treatment conditions.”  Caffeine is useful for manipulating arousal.

Tea, unless it is decaf, contains caffeine. Normal tea contains more caffeine than coffee when in dry form. Tea contains “two caffeine metabolites: theophylline, which is a stronger stimulant than caffeine, and theobromine, which is slightly weaker than caffeine.” “The caffeine in tea can increase the excitability of the CNS, so to help people boost morale, improve thinking and memory, increase attention, eliminate fatigue and improve work efficiency.”

An ointment based on green tea was added to the “Prescription Drug Product List” by NDA in 2006.

http://www.sciencedirect.com.ezaccess.libraries.psu.edu/science/article/pii/S0306987710003531