Coffee and tea drinkers rejoice – there are coffee health benefits to be had.

Some new research confirms your wise choice of beverage!

It seems that women who drink a few cups of tea or coffee every day might have a lower risk of endometrial cancer, the most common cancer of a woman’s reproductive organs.

According to American Cancer Society estimates for 2008, just over 40,000 women in the U.S. would be diagnosed with this form of cancer; about 7,400 will have died from it.

Some of the risk factors for this type of cancer are well known.

Older age, obesity and anything that exposes women to more estrogen, like early periods, infertility, late menopause and estrogen therapy afterward are all considered risk factors.

If you’re concerned for yourself or another woman in your life, talk to your doctor about what you can do.

You may have heard that diet may also play a role, but the effect is far less clear than the other risks. This study sought answers to the role popular drinks might play in cancer risk.

The hospital based, case controlled research involved a survey of nearly 1,100 women; 541 patients diagnosed with endometrial cancer, 541 controls who had a uterus and were seen at the Roswell Park Cancer Institute in Buffalo, New York for evaluation but were not diagnosed with a malignancy.

Data was collected between 1982 and 1998 using a very detailed questionnaire that was offered to all patients who were seen at the facility for cancer. About half the patients given the survey returned the completed questionnaire.

Those who drank regular coffee or black tea appeared to have a lower risk of uterine cancer than women who were nondrinkers.

Subjects who drank 4 cups of coffee or tea/day were only half as likely as those who didn’t drink these beverages to have endometrial cancer.

Women who drank tea only (over 2 cups/day) had a 44% lower risk of disease. The lower risk was there for women who just drank coffee (over 2 cups/day), at just 29%, though this figure was not considered statistically significant in terms of research.

The researchers are quick to point out that part of the benefit they saw for drinking coffee or tea might be affected by body mass index. The reduction in risk of endometrial cancer, even in tea drinkers, was limited for those women who weighed more.

No one is certain why regular coffee and black tea might have this effect on cancer, but lead researcher Dr. Susan E. McCann of the Roswell Park Cancer Institute suspects caffeine.

Subjects included decaffeinated coffee as one of the drinks they enjoyed, but when the looked at decaffeinated coffee, there wasn’t a link between the drink and the risk of endometrial cancer.

Lab work has shown that caffeine induces some enzymes that help to neutralize potential cancer causing substances.

If it isn’t the caffeine, there are some other helpful compounds that might be at work. Coffee and tea have antioxidants, flavonoids, catechins and isoflavones that could also be helping to protect the body from cancer.

Now that there’s been a large, carefully controlled study, adding to an existing body of work that shows a relationship between regular coffee and black tea consumption and endometrial cancers, you might want to choose these beverages more often.

Your choice of drink is of course not a guarantee of protection despite the coffee health benefits and should never take the place of regular medical care, a healthy diet and other careful lifestyle choices.

By: Kirsten Whittaker