Does Coffee Trigger Cortisol Release?

Posted on October 12, 2015 by MaryO

coffee-prescription

 

Cortisol is the infamous hormone you release when you’re stressed. In high doses it inhibits brain function, slows metabolism, breaks down muscle, and increases blood pressure. Have you ever felt panicked before a public speech and forgotten everything you were going to say? That’s what a big bump in cortisol feels like. And if you’re looking for stress relief, lowering cortisol helps.

Cortisol isn’t all bad, though. In fact, it’s necessary for you to function. Cortisol peaks in the morning, helping to wake you up, and it can be a useful as an indicator of strain, letting you know when to slow down or stop something that’s stressing you out. Cortisol also decreases inflammation – that’s part of the reason your body releases it in response to, for example, a workout that tears your muscle tissue.

Low cortisol is an issue, too. Insufficient cortisol can leave you feeling tired, emotional, and anxious. As long as you avoid chronically elevated or depleted cortisol you can make the little hormone work to your advantage.

A common argument against drinking coffee is that it triggers cortisol release, but (forgive us for getting nitpicky) that may not be true. Caffeine definitely triggers cortisol release. In fact, the increase in cortisol is part of the reason caffeine makes you feel more alert.

Remember a few paragraphs ago, when we were talking about how you build a tolerance to some of caffeine’s effects but not others? Cortisol release is one of the effects to which you build tolerance. If you only take caffeine now and then, it causes a big boost in cortisol. But if you get caffeine daily (by drinking coffee every morning, for example) your body tempers the cortisol response. You still release cortisol, but not enough to worry about unless your cortisol is already out of whack.

Does coffee itself (separate from caffeine) cause cortisol release? Mycotoxins do, at least in mice, and they cause inflammation (a common trigger of cortisol release) in humans. It’s difficult to say whether mold-free coffee increases cortisol.

Regardless, studies suggest that cortisol release from caffeine is mild if you drink it daily. For most of us, that little bump shouldn’t be a problem.

From https://www.yahoo.com/health/caffeine-and-cortisol-does-coffee-1276507994071094.html

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Enzyme that triggers muscle wasting could be key to REVERSING signs of ageing | Daily Mail Online

Posted on May 21, 2015 by MaryO

Drawing on expertise from both the University of Birmingham and Queen Elizabeth Hospitals Birmingham, they applied their knowledge of Cushing’s syndrome to the new problem (sarcopenia).

Cushing’s is hormonal disorder caused by high levels of cortisol. Patients suffer from the syndrome see marked changes in their body composition.

The effects can be devastating for patients who can develop features such as muscle wasting and weakness, weight gain, thinning of the bones, diabetes, high blood pressure and heart disease.

Dr Hassan-Smith said: ‘Looking at this particular enzyme seemed like an intriguing way forward.

‘We knew how it works in relation to Cushing’s Syndrome, which is characterised by similar symptoms, and thought it would be worthwhile applying what we knew to the ageing population.’

Currently there are no treatments for sarcopenia, the team explained.

But pharmaceutical companies are developing and testing ways to block or switch off the enzyme, with a focus on treatments for conditions including diabetes.

The team is excited about taking the results of their study forward into future research, with one eye on adapting the inhibitors already in development to combat muscle ageing.

Dr Hassan Smith added: ‘The next stage is a “proof of concept” study to look at the effects of these inhibitive pharmaceuticals on muscle function, before opening it up into a clinical trial.

‘It’s an as yet unexplored area that could yield beneficial results for a problem that is becoming more prevalent as our lifespans increase.’

The study was published in the journal of Clinical Endocrinology and Metabolism.

 

via Enzyme that triggers muscle wasting could be key to REVERSING signs of ageing | Daily Mail Online.

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Depressed? Anxious? It Could Be An Early Symptom Of These Illnesses

Posted on February 19, 2015 by MaryO

In the January 2015 edition of Psychotherapy and Psychsomatics, a group of Italian researchers explored whether depression, anxiety, and other psychiatric mood disorders might be early symptoms of medical disorders, as opposed to being “just” psychological symptoms.

Their research showed that depression in particular can be a strong indicator of other forms of illness, finding it “to be the most common affective prodrome [early symptom] of medical disorders and was consistently reported in Cushing’s syndrome, hypothyroidism, hyperparathyroidism, pancreatic and lung cancer, myocardial infarction, Wilson’s disease, and AIDS.”

Read the entire article here: Depressed? Anxious? It Could Be An Early Symptom Of These Illnesses.

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Seminar: Putting Patients First

Posted on August 22, 2013 by MaryO

putting-patients

 

September 30, 2013 | 9:30 am – 2:30 pm
W Hotel, 515 15th Street, NW, Washington, DC

How do patients, providers, and payers know whether health information is credible, accurate, useful or appropriate?

Comparative effectiveness research (CER) has the potential to improve health outcomes by helping people make better-informed decisions. But how do we know that CER will generate information that is useful?

You can help us find the answers by joining us on September 30 for a conversation and symposium featuring a broad range of health care stakeholders—patients, providers, policymakers, payers, researchers, and those who fund research. We’ll focus on an effort led by the National Health Council to create a framework to guide the development of CER, evaluate its results, and assist in communicating the findings to the right audiences.

Be a part of the conversation—register today and add your voice to our efforts to make CER useful. Tweet about it using #useCER.

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Classifying hypertension

Posted on May 19, 2013 by MaryO

HYPERTENSION is classified into two categories according to its cause: essential and secondary.

The vast majority of patients have essential or primary hypertension, while only about 5-10% of patients have secondary hypertension, which are mainly caused by kidney and hormonal conditions like renal artery stenosis, hyperthyroidism, Cushing’s syndrome, and even pregnancy, among others.

The exact cause of essential hypertension is still unknown, although it is certainly the result of a combination of factors, including increasing age, having relatives with high blood pressure (ie family history), a sedentary lifestyle, a poor diet with too much salt, drinking too much alcohol, smoking and too much stress.

Says Malaysian Society of Hypertension president and Universiti Malaya Department of Primary Care Medicine senior consultant Prof Datin Dr Chia Yook Chin: “Each factor increases blood pressure by just a little, but when you add them all together little by little, it raises it by quite a lot.”

Despite not knowing the root cause of hypertension, it has been established that there is overstimulation of the sympathetic nerves in people with this condition.

This in turn increases the secretion of certain hormones involved in the regulation of sodium and fluids in the body, called renin, angiotensin, and aldosterone.

The amount of salt and water in our body affects our blood pressure – the more salt and water present, the higher our blood pressure.

These two elements are regulated by our kidneys through the three hormones mentioned above, which are produced by the adrenal glands located on top of the kidneys.

The overstimulation of the sympathetic nerves also results in increased vascular tone, which causes our arteries to become constricted, thus, also raising blood pressure.

From The Star

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