Diabetics, please note -- it's time that you cut down on coffee, otherwise you might never be able to control your blood sugar levels.
A team of international researchers has carried out a study and found that diabetics who drink coffee daily increase their blood sugar levels as well as undermine efforts to bring their condition under control.
"Coffee is such a common drink in our society that we forget that it contains a very powerful drug -- caffeine. Our study suggests that one way to lower blood sugar is to simply quit drinking coffee or any other caffeinated beverages," 'The Daily Telegraph' quoted lead researcher James Lane as saying.
Lane of the Duke University Medical Centre in Durham and his fellow researchers came to the conclusion after they tracked the blood sugar levels of ten patients with diabetes.
All the participants were fitted with a tiny monitor which continuously tracked their glucose levels over a 72-hour period. The team gave them pills containing caffeine equal to around four cups of coffee on one day, and identical capsules containing a placebo on another.
All were free to eat whatever they liked. They found that when the participants consumed caffeine, their average daily sugar levels went up by eight per cent.
Caffeine also exaggerated the rise in glucose after meals, increasing by nine per cent after breakfast, 15 per cent after lunch and 26 per cent after dinner, the researchers found -- the results of which have been published in the 'Diabetes Care' journal.
"If further studies corroborate the results, there would be a case for doctors to instruct patients with diabetes to banish caffeine from their diets altogether," Lane was quoted as saying.
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