Green coffee bean extract is a new ingredient on the market. Green coffee bean has strong anti-oxidant properties similar to other natural anti-oxidants like green tea and grape seed extract. Green coffee beans have polyphenols which act to help reduce free oxygen radicals in the body. Green coffee bean extract is sometimes standardized to more than 50% chlorogenic acid. Chlorogenic Acid is the compound present in coffee which has been long known as for its beneficial properties. This active ingredient makes green coffee bean an excellent agent to absorb free oxygen radicals; as well as helping to avert hydroxyl radicals, both which contribute to degradation of cells in the body.  Green coffee bean extract is made from the green beans of the coffea Arabica plant. There are two types of coffee plants, arabica and robusta... the arabica is higher in quality and higher in chlorogenic and caffeic acids, two primary compounds responsible for anti-oxidant activity.
   Boiled coffee drinks contain cafestol which is associated with the negative effects of using coffee as a stimulant, this is not present in green coffee beans or the extract.

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Benefits of Diet Rx
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Improves will power and choice of food selection

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Twice a month you will receive an email with brief abstracts of several new studies on various supplements and natural medicine topics and their practical interpretation by Ray Sahelian, M.D. We will mention research updates on green coffee when available.
 

The History of Coffee
The history of coffee dates back more than a thousand years. Originally, coffee beans were used as a food. East African tribes would grind the coffee berries together, mixing the results into a paste with animal fat. Later, around 1000 AD, Ethiopians made a type of wine from coffee berries, fermenting the dried beans in water. Coffee also grew naturally on the Arabian Peninsula where it was first developed into a hot drink. Despite decades of research on coffee and caffeine, there are many misconceptions about the potential health risks associated with coffee. Coffee is one of the world's most important primary commodities; it ranks second only to petroleum in terms of dollars traded worldwide. With over 400 billion cups consumed every year, coffee is the world's most popular beverage. Worldwide, 25 million small producers rely on coffee for a living.

Potential Health Benefits of Coffee
Coffee contains anti-oxidants reducing free oxygen radicals
Can increase the effectiveness of pain killers, especially for migraine medications
Helps the body burn a higher proportion of lipids to carbohydrates
Coffee contains caffeine which has positive and negative attributes depending on dosage used, timing, and frequency.

It's surprising when something that was once considered questionable for your health turns out to have health benefits, usually with the proviso to use it "in moderation." That happened with chocolate and alcohol, and now it is coffee's turn. Here's some of the mostly good news about coffee, and some concerns:

Heart Rhythm abnormalities: It is possible that excessive coffee consumption raises the risk for heart palpitations.

Blood pressure. Results from long-term studies are showing that one or two cups of coffee may not increase the risk for high blood pressure over time. Study findings for other cardiovascular effects are a mixed bag.

Coronary artery disease: Drinking two cups of caffeinated coffee decreases blood flow to the heart during exercise, and the reduction may be most pronounced at high altitudes. While healthy people may tolerate the reduced blood flow fairly easily, it may be harmful to people with coronary artery disease.

Cancer. Coffee might have anti-cancer properties. Researchers found that coffee drinkers were 50% less likely to get liver cancer than nondrinkers. A few studies have found ties to lower rates of colon, breast, and rectal cancers.

Cholesterol. Two substances in coffee -- kahweol and cafestol -- raise cholesterol levels. Paper filters capture these substances, but that doesn't help the many people who now drink non-filtered coffee drinks, such as lattes.

Diabetes. Heavy coffee drinkers may be half as likely to get diabetes as light drinkers or nondrinkers. Coffee may contain chemicals that lower blood sugar. A coffee habit may also increase your resting metabolism rate, which could help keep diabetes at bay.

Parkinson's disease. Coffee seems to protect men, but not women, against Parkinson's disease. One possible explanation for the sex difference may be that estrogen and caffeine need the same enzymes to be metabolized, and estrogen captures those enzymes.

Coffee and Diabetes
Moderate consumption of caffeinated or decaffeinated coffee may lower the risk of type 2 diabetes in middle-aged and younger women. Dr. Rob M. van Dam from the Harvard School of Public Health, Boston, and colleagues evaluated the consumption of different types of coffee in relation to the development of type 2 diabetes in more than 88,000 US women followed in the Nurses Health Study II. In general, higher coffee consumption, both caffeinated and decaffeinated, was associated with a lower risk of type 2 diabetes. The reduction in risk was 13 percent with one cup of coffee per day, and as much as 47 percent with four or more cups. The reduced risk of type 2 diabetes was limited to filtered coffee and instant coffee, the report indicates, whereas consumption of espresso or percolator coffee did not significantly reduce the risk. Source: Diabetes Care, February 2006.

Is Coffee a Functional Food?
The worldwide use of coffee for social engagement, leisure, enhancement of work performance and well-being is widely recognized. Depending on the quantities consumed, it can affect the intake of some minerals (K, Mg, Mn, Cr), niacin and antioxidant substances. Epidemiological and experimental studies have shown positive effects of regular coffee-drinking on various aspects of health, such as psychoactive responses (alertness, mood change), neurological (infant hyperactivity, Alzheimer's and Parkinson's diseases) and metabolic disorders (diabetes, gallstones, liver cirrhosis), and gonad and liver function. Despite this, most reviews do not mention coffee as fulfilling the criteria for a functional food. Unlike other functional foods that act on a defined population with a special effect, the wide use of coffee-drinking impacts a broad demographic (from children to the elderly), with a wide spectrum of health benefits. However, there is a down side to coffee drinking. Coffee can cause anxiety and blood pressure problems, and it could also cause or aggravate heart rhythm abnormalities. Hence, it is possible to claim that coffee, when limited to one cup a day could be considered a functional food, but not when 3 or more cups are drank a day, particularly if the coffee is ingested later in the day and causes insomnia.

Green Coffee Research
Green coffee bean extract improves human vasoreactivity.
Hypertension Research. 2004 Oct;27(10):731-7.
Biological Science Laboratories, Kao Corp, Tochigi, Japan.
Our previous study revealed the antihypertensive effects of green coffee bean extract ingestion in spontaneously hypertensive rats. We suggested that this antihypertensive action was due to the fact that green coffee bean extract contains chlorogenic acid (CQA) as a major phenolic compound, and CQA in turn contains ferulic acid as a metabolic component that acts on nitric oxide (NO) derived from the vascular endothelium. In this study, the effects of green coffee bean extract on blood vessels were evaluated in healthy males. The subjects were 20 healthy males with reduced vasodilation responses measured by strain gauge plethysmograms (SPG) to ischemic reactive hyperemia. Of the 20 subjects, 10 (mean age, 37.2 years) ingested a test drink containing green coffee bean extract (CQA: 140 mg/day), and the other 10 (mean age, 34.8 years) ingested a placebo drink for 4 months. During the ingestion period, SPG, pulse wave velocity (PWV), and serum biochemical parameters were measured, and acceleration plethysmograms (APG) were taken. The reactive hyperemia ratio (RHR) in the test drink group began to increase after ingestion for 1 month and was significantly higher than that in the placebo group after ingestion for 3 months and 4 months. In addition, after ingestion for 4 months, the test drink group showed a significant decrease in the plasma total homocysteine level compared with the pre-ingestion level. However, there were no significant differences in PWV or APG between the test drink group and the placebo drink group. The improvement in RHR after ingestion of a drink containing GCE suggested an improvement in vasoreactivity by this component.

Green coffee bean availability by herb and vitamin suppliers
Green coffee bean is sold in a variety of extracts including 30 percent chlorogenic acid concentration.

Green Coffee extract questions
Q. Can a green coffee extract be taken the same day as tongkat ali, choline, dmae, or carnosine? I forgot to ask about saw palmetto.
     A. These nutrients and herbs you mention above are very stimulating, so it would be preferable not to take them the same day.

Q. What you refer to as “Green Coffee Extract”: Is this product an actual extract of green coffee (solvent type extraction) or simply green coffee beans ground to a fine powder?
     A. This is a new page we have put up and we still are trying to learn more about green coffee extract to update our page.