皮膚科 劉權毅醫師

28 October 2011

10th American Association for Cancer Research International Conference on Frontiers in Cancer Prevention Research; Boston, Massachusetts, USA: 22–25 October 2011

MedWire News: Drinking more than three cups of coffee a day could significantly reduce a person's risk for basal cell carcinoma (BCC), suggest study findings.

"Given the nearly 1 million new cases of BCC diagnosed each year in the United States, daily dietary factors with even small protective effects may have great public health impact," explained study author Fengju Song, from Harvard Medical School, Boston, Massachusetts, USA, in a press statement.

"Our study indicates that coffee consumption may be an important option to help prevent BCC," he said.

The researchers analyzed data for 72,921 people in the Nurses' Health Study and 39,976 from the Health Professionals Follow-up Study who were followed up from 1984-2008 and 1986-2008, respectively, to assess links between coffee consumption and skin cancer.

Across both cohorts, 25,480 cases of incident skin cancer were reported over the follow-up periods. Of these, 22,786 were BCC, 1953 were squamous cell carcinoma (SCC), and 741 were melanoma.

Presenting the data at the 10th American Association for Cancer Research International Conference, Song reported that coffee consumption was significantly inversely associated with BCC in women, but not in men.

More specifically, compared with women who drank less than one cup of coffee a month (lowest consumption), those who drank more than three cups a day (highest consumption) had a 20% lower relative risk for BCC.

There was a trend for a decreased risk for BCC in men in the highest versus the lowest category for coffee consumption, but it was not statistically significant.

When caffeine consumption was considered separately, both women and men in the highest consumption category had significantly reduced risk for BCC compared with those in the lowest category, with relative risk reductions of 18% and 13%, respectively.

Given the further finding that no significant reduction in risk for BCC was seen in people drinking higher versus lower amounts of decaffeinated coffee, the researchers conclude that the observed protective effect is likely to be due to increased caffeine consumption rather than coffee consumption per se.

"Mouse studies have shown that oral or topical caffeine promotes elimination of Ultraviolet-damaged keratinocytes via apoptosis (programmed cell death) and markedly reduces subsequent SCC development," Song said.

"However, in our cohort analysis, we did not find any inverse association between coffee consumption and the risk for SCC."

He concluded that additional studies are needed to investigate the underlying mechanism of the protective effect of coffee consumption in more detail.

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