Caffeine 101: Benefits and Concerns

Every day a new article crosses the various news feeds touting the benefits of caffeine. With so many articles and caffeine products screaming for our attention, have you ever wondered how caffeine works in the human body? Its benefits, possible side effects, and safe dosage levels?

How Caffeine works? 

To best understand how caffeine works, we first have to understand adenosine. Adenosine naturally builds in the brain throughout the day and acts as a central nervous system depressant. Adenosine’s purpose is to sedate and relax the brain to promote deep sleep. 

Caffeine interrupts the binding of adenosine to its receptors and wakes up the brain. The interruption of adenosine binding impacts other systems, too, including adrenaline, acetylcholine, dopamine, and serotonin. 

Adrenaline is the hormone responsible for the fight or flight response to perceived danger. It makes the body more alert and ready to act. Adrenaline releases glucose into the bloodstream and increases blood flow to muscles. 

Acetylcholine transmits messages in both the central and peripheral nervous systems where it stimulates muscle contraction. In the brain, acetylcholine plays an important role in cognition and memory recall. Extremely low levels of acetylcholine are associated with the cognitive decline of Alzheimer’s disease. 

Dopamine transmits messages between nerve cells and is associated with feeling pleasure. Dopamine boosts mood and helps a person focus, plan, and engage in thought processes. 

Serotonin is often called the natural ‘feel good’ chemical. It is a neurotransmitter. In the brain, it regulates mood and memory. However, serotonin plays an important role in digestion, blood clotting, sexual function, bone density, and sleep, too.

Research-Backed Health Benefits of Caffeine

Caffeine impacts adenosine binding. This aids mental and physical performance as adrenaline, acetylcholine, dopamine, and serotonin functioning increases. It takes roughly forty-five minutes to an hour from caffeine ingestion to maximum caffeine concentration in blood serum. Maximum caffeine blood serum concentration can last for two to three hours with total caffeine benefits lasting up to six hours.

Helps Improve Cognitive Functioning

Several studies have shown caffeine supplementation may significantly help improve alertness, reaction time, and accuracy when completing simple math quizzes and logical reasoning tasks. One study found a 150 mg dose of caffeine helped improve cognitive performance for four hours.

Pain Relievers

Caffeine helps constrict blood vessels and has anti-inflammatory properties. In a clinical review, researchers found taking caffeine with the pain reliever acetaminophen may aid acetaminophen’s effectiveness by up to forty percent.

Athletic Performance Enhancement

Caffeine has been shown to support athletic endurance when taken in the 3-6 mg per kg body weight range. For a 180-pound athlete, that dosage equates to 243-487 mg of caffeine.  Caffeine helps oxidize fat stores and aids fat burning with glycogen to fuel exercise. By burning both fat and glycogen the time to complete muscle exhaustion is increased to allow longer workout sessions.

A meta-analysis of past caffeine studies found caffeine supplementation may help improve both strength and power, especially in the upper body. Using the Wingate Anaerobic Test to measure anaerobic power, one study found caffeine supplementation resulted in an eight percent increase in peak anaerobic power and a six percent increase in mean anaerobic power.

Weight Loss

Caffeine aids heat production and helps increase the resting metabolic rate to burn fat. One study found a 100 mg supplementation of caffeine helped increase the metabolic rate of participants by three to four percent for two and a half hours. The same study found taking 100 mg of caffeine every two hours in twelve hours aided in burning up to an additional 150 calories.

Reduce Risk of Heart Disease, Stroke, and Type II Diabetes

Regular caffeine consumption may reduce the risk of heart disease or other heart-related conditions dependent upon individual circumstances. One meta-analysis found no clinical backing for the popular hypothesis that regular caffeine consumption increased the risk of coronary heart disease.  

Another meta-analysis found a weak inverse relationship between moderate coffee consumption and risk of stroke. This inverse relationship means as coffee consumption went up, the risk of stroke went slightly down. 

And yet, another meta-analysis found the risk of Type II Diabetes decreased by up to fourteen percent for every increment of 200 mg/day of caffeine supplementation. The association between caffeine supplementation and decreased risk of Type II Diabetes was stronger for men than women. 

Initial use of caffeine may slightly raise blood pressure. However, with regular caffeine consumption, this effect tends to subside.

Reduced Liver Hepatic Fibrosis

Consuming more than 2 cups of coffee per day may help reduced liver fibrosis, (the scarring and thickening of liver tissue) according to a study of patients suffering from hepatitis C.

Side Effects of Too Much Caffeine

Consuming caffeine daily increases the risk of developing a tolerance. Once a person has developed a caffeine tolerance, higher doses of caffeine are required to achieve the same mental and physical performance benefits. 

Once tolerance has developed, a person can simply go off of caffeine for a month to reset their body. Caffeine withdrawal symptoms start within twelve to twenty-four hours. Withdrawal symptoms can be severe and include headache, irritability, drowsiness, and lack of concentration. 

The United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA) lists headaches, insomnia, anxiousness, jitters, fast heart rate, nausea, and feeling unhappy as signs of consuming too much caffeine.

Health Conditions that should Avoid or Limit Caffeine

Individuals who should avoid or limit caffeine intake include those suffering from 

• Arrhythmia, a heart condition causing difficulties with heart rhythm. A person with arrhythmia feels like their heart flutters or races. 
• High blood pressure, especially if you are not a regular caffeine user as caffeine can temporarily spike blood pressure. 
• High levels of anxiety. Caffeine has been shown to increase cortisol levels. Sustained high levels of cortisol can provoke or make mental issues worse including anxiety and mood swings. 

Safe Dosage Levels

The FDA cites 400 mg of daily caffeine is not associated with dangerous side effects for healthy individuals. 

The American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists define moderate caffeine consumption for pregnant women at less than 200 mg of caffeine a day. A systematic review of moderate caffeine consumption during pregnancy found no conclusive evidence associated with low birth weight or fetal growth. 

Regular caffeine use can result in building a tolerance. Staggering caffeine use disrupts tolerance buildup while maintaining the health and performance benefits of caffeine.

What contains Caffeine? 

Caffeine seems to be everywhere. Who drinks caffeine? Anyone drinking coffee, tea, hot chocolate, energy drinks, or a caffeinated soft drink is drinking caffeine. Even decaffeinated coffee contains caffeine. Dr. Bruce A Goldburg, a researcher connected with the University of Florida, reports 5-10 cups of decaffeinated coffee has the same amount of caffeine present in up to two cups of regular coffee.  

The caffeine content in beverages varies widely. The Center for Science in the Public Interest tabulates all the various drink sources of caffeine in one convenient web page. This information helps people seeking to avoid caffeine. It also helps caffeine consumers to determine their total consumption of caffeine per day.  

Discover the Benefits of SOS’s Caffeine Capsules 

Regardless if you take a caffeine capsule or drink coffee, the caffeine structure is the same and provides the same possible health and performance benefits. However, consuming caffeine in beverages or other caffeine products increases the consumption of additional calories, added sugars, artificial sweeteners, and processed chemicals. 

SOS’s 180 mg Caffeine Capsule is a perfect way to get all the health benefits of two cups of coffee without unnecessary calories or chemicals. At $0.11/dose, our caffeine capsule is substantially more cost-effective and convenient than purchasing coffee or energy drinks. 

If you are new to caffeine supplementation, a 100 mg caffeine dose may be all you need to see possible performance benefits. SOS’s Caffeine Citrate Capsule contains roughly 100 mg of caffeine at $.05/dose.

Try SOS’s Caffeine Capsules today to discover the possible benefits of caffeine at tremendous savings. You can conveniently purchase the SOS’s Caffeine Capsules on our website or Amazon.com.

These statements on Caffeine supplementation have not been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration. This product is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure or prevent any disease. Seek appropriate medical advice before starting any supplement regime.

The content of SOS’s website is for information only, not advice or guarantee of outcome. Information is gathered and shared from reputable sources; however, SOS is not responsible for errors or omissions in reporting or explanation. No individuals, including those taking SOS products, should use the information, resources, or tools contained within to self-diagnosis or self-treat any health-related condition. SOS gives no assurance or warranty regarding the accuracy, timeliness, or applicability of the content.

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