However, some arrhythmologists and electrophysiologists sing a different tune. When I was diagnosed with something complex and novel that results in ventricular arrhythmia (PVCs and VT), my EP was, to put it mildly, uninterested in my consumption of caffeine. He said that, at worst, it made no significant difference. That was a few years ago. I was pleasantly surprised.
One the other hand, I find that dark chocolate has more negative heart effects: I associate dark chocolate, maybe unfairly, with premature beats (several 1000s per day). For that reason, I've avoided dark chocolate, which I love, for almost 25 years.
could you give some explanation why it is against common sense exactly in your opinion?
Under "Conclusions and Research Needs":
> Last, in terms of applications of the potential beneficial effects of coffee intake, it is worth studying whether introducing or initiating regular coffee consumption among current abstainers yields positive cardiovascular health benefits.
In other words, more study is needed to determine whether abstainers should start consuming caffeine.
Additionally, the study suggests much of the cardiovascular benefits are from non-caffeine compounds in coffee/tea:
> Although much of the evidence on caffeine derives from studies of coffee consumption, coffee contains numerous bioactive compounds beyond caffeine, including chlorogenic acids, diterpenes, trigonelline, and melanoidins. In large cohort studies, inverse associations between coffee intake and risk of type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular disease have also been observed for decaffeinated coffee, supporting a role for noncaffeine components.
That is interesting because caffeine as low as ~80mg is one of my triggers for AFIB and arrhythmia and absolutely wrecks me within 15 minutes of consumption. I was not a regular coffee drinker though, so maybe the "regular drinkers" bit in that statement is the significant factor here.
Unfortunately this particular intervention wasn't successful (not much difference between treatment and control groups). But conceivably, afib triggers is something that varies from person to person and perhaps a future design would tease this out.
Biggest triggers are caffeine, alcohol, and sleep deprivation (correlated with my sleep apnea events) for me. I see exercise is only reported as being slightly higher than caffeine here, but exercise (stationary bike, strength training) usually causes my episodes to self-correct; I usually attribute this to the more controlled breathing during exercise, but I have no proof. I also seem to have a much larger threshold of triggering AFIB with alcohol than I do coffee. I have to reach the moderately drunk stage to induce a flare with alcohol. If I keep things near a light-buzz, I can typically get away with no issues.
At that time, I was on an opioid pain killer for an abscess. The next time I was on an opioid pain killer, years later, I also had an afib episode. So I wonder if maybe I have some sensitivity to opioids.
cubefox•12h ago
1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mach_bands