Black Coffee Health Benefits - Is Coffee Good for Us and Could it Help Us Live Longer

It has long been an adored drink of the civilized world, but coffee is much more than a social beverage enjoyed by almost every society and culture around the globe. We drink it in the morning to give us a morning 'kick' and we drink it at various times throughout the day, either at work or home simply because it is the 'done thing'. The main component of coffee is caffeine as we know, but what many people still do not realize is that this often 'hated' substance (my partner detests the taste and smell of it), actually has many health benefits and could even make you smarter. We have covered a great deal more on the subject of coffee and its effects on health on our website (that link will take you to the page), but here we wanted to cover some of the specifics of these health benefits. This has been proved in many laboratory and other tests and studies, by authorities like Harvard School of Public Health and the Florida Alzheimer's Research Center. Harvard published the results of a study which involved over forty thousand men between 1986 and 1998 and over eighty-thousand women between 1980 to 1998. During the research, over five thousand new cases of type 2 diabetes were reported. The study tracked the caffeine intake of test subjects during this time. And the results showed that men who consumed high amounts of caffeine, were fifty percent less likely to get type 2 diabetes then men who did not consume any at all. In women, this figure was around thirty percent who drank high quantities of coffee, against those who did not. A subject which is close to my heart is Alzheimer's disease, because my elderly grandmother has suffered from it for around ten years. Our family has been literally torn apart by what has happened to her. She lives in a nursing home now where she has twenty four hours a day care and supervision. She no longer knows who I am, nor does she know who my daughter is. It is incredibly upsetting to go see her and come away knowing these things. But she still smiles and laughs at thing she see's so I know she is not suffering any pain from it. I think there comes a point with this horrible disease, where it affects a patients loved ones more than it does the patient, simply because they do not know 'what is what'. Could caffeine help halt the effects of Alzheimer's? Yes, and this was proved by Dr Gary Arendash from Alzheimer’s Disease Research Center, in Florida. He concluded in tests done on mice, that when high amounts of caffeine were ingested, these test subjects performed at a higher level than the mice who were not given any caffeine. Coffee can also help to cure constipation by stimulating peristalsis, which is our bodies naturally occurring large colon contractions which help to push food waste through our digestive system. But there is a fine line to be drawn in having a cup of coffee to help you go to the toilet, and having too much because it will dehydrate your body. If you drink too much coffee, you will become dehydrated because of it's diuretic effects. So if you do find yourself drinking a nice strong cup of 'Joe' to help you along, make certain that you also consume enough water to replace lost fluids.