BACKGROUND:

We examined the association between long-term habitual coffee consumption and risk of coronary heart disease (CHD).

METHODS AND RESULTS:

We performed a prospective cohort study with 44,005 men and 84,488 women without history of cardiovascular disease or cancer. Coffee consumption was first assessed in 1986 for men and in 1980 for women and then repeatedly every 2 to 4 years; the follow-up continued through 2000. We documented 2173 incident cases of coronary heart disease (1449 nonfatal myocardial infarctions and 724 fatal cases of CHD) among men and 2254 cases (1561 nonfatal myocardial infarctions and 693 fatal cases of CHD) among women. Among men, after adjustment for age, smoking, and other CHD risk factors, the relative risks (RRs) of CHD across categories of cumulative coffee consumption (<1 cup/mo, 1 cup/mo to 4 cups/wk, 5 to 7 cups/wk, 2 to 3 cups/d, 4 to 5 cups/d, and > or =6 cups/d) were 1.0, 1.04 (95% confidence interval 0.91 to 1.17), 1.02 (0.91 to 1.15), 0.97 (0.86 to 1.11), 1.07 (0.88 to 1.31), and 0.72 (0.49 to 1.07; P for trend=0.41); among women, the RRs were 1.0, 0.97 (0.83 to 1.14), 1.02 (0.90 to 1.17), 0.84 (0.74 to 0.97), 0.99 (0.83 to 1.17), and 0.87 (0.68 to 1.11; P for trend=0.08). Stratification by smoking status, alcohol consumption, history of type 2 diabetes mellitus, and body mass index gave similar results. Similarly, we found no effect when the most recent coffee consumption was examined. RRs for quintiles of caffeine intake varied from 0.97 (0.84 to 1.10) in the second quintile to 0.97 (0.84 to 1.11) in the highest quintile (P for trend=0.82) in men and from 1.02 (0.90 to 1.16) to 0.97 (0.85 to 1.11; P for trend=0.37) in women.

CONCLUSIONS:

These data do not provide any evidence that coffee consumption increases the risk of CHD.