Scientists pooled and analyzed data from 14 previous studies on about 10,000 patients with head and neck cancer and a control group of more than 15,000 individuals who didn’t have these malignancies. All of the participants completed dietary questionnaires detailing how much caffeinated coffee, decaffeinated coffee, and tea they consumed.
Overall, people who drank more than four cups of caffeinated coffee a day had a 17 percent lower risk of developing head and neck cancer compared with people who didn’t consume any coffee at all, according to findings published in Cancer.
Up to one cup of tea daily was also associated with a 9 percent lower risk of head and neck cancer.
Risk Reduction Depends on Type of Cancer
There wasn’t a meaningful connection between decaffeinated coffee consumption and the overall risk of head and neck cancers. But drinking decaf was tied to a 25 percent lower risk of oral cavity cancer.
When researchers looked at specific types of head and neck cancer, they also found drinking four or more cups of caffeinated coffee was tied to 30 percent lower risk of oral cavity cancer and a 22 percent lower risk of throat cancer.
Drinking three to four cups of caffeinated coffee daily was associated with a 41 percent lower risk of hypopharyngeal cancer, which develops at the bottom of the throat.
In addition, tea drinkers had a 29 percent lower risk of hypopharyngeal cancer than people who didn’t drink tea. But more than one cup of tea daily was tied to a 38 percent greater risk of laryngeal cancer.
The Study Has Limitations
The new analysis wasn’t designed to prove whether or how various levels of coffee or tea drinking might directly cause or prevent specific types of cancer. But the findings do suggest that more research into this question might help determine the role these beverages could play in cancer prevention, says senior study author Yuan-Chin Amy Lee, PhD, an adjunct associate professor at the Huntsman Cancer Institute and School of Medicine at University of Utah in Salt Lake City.
“Coffee and tea habits are fairly complex and these findings support the need for more data and further studies around the impact coffee and tea can have on reducing risk of cancer,” Dr. Lee says.
In the meantime, it’s worth at least having a conversation with your healthcare provider about whether your coffee or tea habit might influence your cancer risk, Lee advises.
Smoking and Drinking Alcohol Have a Greater Impact on Head and Neck Cancer Risk
While it’s possible that a variety of antioxidants and other compounds in coffee and tea with anti-cancer properties may play a role in reducing the risk of head and neck cancer, it’s also possible that people who consume these beverages have other habits that impact their risk, says Luís Monteiro, PhD, DDS, an associate professor of medicine and oral surgery at the University Institute of Health Sciences in Oporto, Portugal, who wasn’t involved in the new study.
“For example, it is possible that people who drink coffee in their free time prefer coffee to alcoholic drinks, and vice versa,” Dr. Monteiro says. One alcoholic drink may lead to another, or be linked to smoking. Drinking and smoking are among the biggest risk factors for head and neck cancers, Monteiro notes.
People trying to reduce their risk should focus first on lowering their alcohol intake and quitting smoking, Monteiro says. They should also get vaccinated to protect against the human papillomavirus (HPV), a sexually transmitted infection that can cause head and neck cancers.
“The indication for coffee and tea consumption as a preventive measure to avoid head and neck cancer is, in my view, for the time being unclear,” Monteiro says. “However, I believe that, in the near future, this could be included in our preventive indications.”
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