You don’t have to be professional basketball star and Bigface brand owner Jimmy Butler to have coffee make you shoot two. Everybody poops, sure, but not everybody poops because of coffee, which still blows my mind but it’s apparently true. Still, coffee has been shown to be healthy for pretty much the entirety of the gastrointestinal tract, and new research suggests that it may also be help prevent irritable bowel syndrome.
As reported by Medical News Today, a new meta-analysis on the topic of coffee and IBS examined data on over 430,000 participants across eight different studies (three of which found a negative relationship between the two). Appearing the in the journal Nutrients, researchers selected studies that were randomized, either controlled or cross-sectional, and focused specifically on the correlation between drinking coffee and IBS.
When looking at the data from the eight studies, researchers believe that coffee’s abundance of bioactive molecules—like polyphenols, diterpenes, trigonelline, and melanoidins—are what give it its positive impact on IBS. This is due to their “antioxidant, anti-fibrotic, and anti-inflammatory properties” as well as their “influence on gut microbiota, bile acids, motility of the intestines, and intestinal permeability.” In layman’s terms, coffee can make you go.
Still, there were three studies that found coffee to negatively impact IBS. The researchers note that these studies were only able to establish a correlation; causation was not proved. They did note that because not all those who experience IBS have the same symptoms, coffee may affect them differently. For instance, those who get diarrhea due to IBS may found it to be exacerbated by coffee consumption.
But those whose symptoms include bloating, constipation, or abdomen pain, all of which can be alleviated to some degree with a BM, coffee ability to stimulate motility and increased intestinal transit may found some relief. The study also notes that there was no minimum amount of coffee needed, so long as consumption was done regularly.
So if you’re experiencing a bout of IBS and need a sweet toot tout suite, make sure you are staying up to date on your coffee consumption. It may help soothe the savage beast (the beast being your rumbling tum tum).
Zac Cadwalader is the managing editor at Sprudge Media Network and a staff writer based in Dallas. Read more Zac Cadwalader on Sprudge.
