Could coffee and herbal tea help protect your liver?

Enjoy a cup of herbal tea or coffee? A study published in the Journal of Hepatology suggests that these popular drinks could help to protect your liver, and prevent the development of advanced diseases.

Chronic liver diseases are among the most serious causes for concern in public health, with liver cirrhosis ranked as the 12th most common cause of death worldwide. Unhealthy habits, like lack of exercise and a high caloric diet, have been linked with causing and exacerbating liver diseases. At the same time, leading a more healthy lifestyle, such as maintaining a balanced diet, can help reduce the development of liver disease.

It seems now that herbal tea and coffee could find themselves on the list of factors that can help protect against liver disease. For the first time, research suggests that increased consumption of herbal tea and coffee could prevent liver fibrosis among the general population.

The study was carried out in Rotterdam, The Netherlands, and involved 2,424 participants aged 45 years or older, who were also involved in The Rotterdam Study. The participants were subjected to various tests, such as hepatological scans to assess liver stiffness, an indicator of liver fibrosis.

They also filled in a 389-item Food Frequency Questionnaire which included questions about their tea and coffee drinking habits over the last month. The amount of tea or coffee consumed was divided into either none, moderate (between 1 and 3 cups a day) and high (over 3 cups a day). The type of tea was split up into either herbal, black or green.

It was found that the amount of herbal tea and coffee consumed showed an inverse relationship with the amount of liver stiffness measured. In other words, as consumption increased, the degree of liver stiffness decreased. The investigators also found that participants who frequently drank coffee appeared to show lower odds of significant liver fibrosis when compared with those who didn’t drink any.

This isn’t the first time that coffee has demonstrated the ability to help promote a healthy liver, according to Dr. Sarwa Darwish, principal investigator of the study and hepatologist at Rotterdam’s Erasmus MC University Medical Centre. “There is quite some epidemiological, but also experimental data suggesting that coffee has health benefits on liver enzyme elevations, viral hepatitis, non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD), cirrhosis and liver cancer,” he commented.

“Beyond the liver, coffee has been demonstrated to be inversely associated with overall mortality in the general population. The exact mechanism is unknown but it is thought that coffee exerts antioxidant effects. We were curious to find out whether coffee consumption would have a similar effect on liver stiffness measurements in individuals without chronic liver disease.”

If this association between the consumption of coffee and herbal tea and protection against liver disease really does exist, then the accessibility and low cost of these drinks would be a huge benefit. Given that they’re the most consumed drinks worldwide, implementing them to protect against advanced liver disease would be of huge benefit towards the health of the general public.

However, it’s important to note that the information resulting from this study is far from rock-solid. The range of participants included was limited, with only those above 45 years of age taking part. There were also very few people who didn’t drink any tea or coffee, which could have had an effect on the outcome of the results. The paper states that further studies would be needed to make sure the information gained from this investigation is accurate.