Coffee consumption protects disease progression in liver cirrhosis and increases long-term survival after liver transplantation

Background: Therapeutic options to treat progression of end-stage liver disease (ESLD) or long-term survival after liver transplantation remain scarce. As coffee consumption has been shown to be hepatoprotective we evaluated its impact in these matters.

Methods: We obtained coffee consumption habits of 379 patients on liver transplantation list with ESLD and 260 patients after liver transplantation. Survival of patients with ESLD and long-term survival after liver transplantation were analyzed based on coffee intake.

Results: 195 patients with ESLD consumed coffee on a daily basis while 184 patients did not. Actuarial survival was impaired (p = 0.041) for patients not drinking coffee (54.9 months ± 5.5; 95% CI: 44.0 – 65.7) compared to coffee drinkers (40.4 months ± 4.3; 95% CI: 32.0 – 48.9). Subgroup analysis showed that survival of patients with alcoholic liver disease (ALD; p = 0.020) and primary sclerosing cholangitis (PSC; p = 0.017) was increased by coffee intake while not affecting patients with chronic viral hepatitis (p =.517) or other liver disease entities (p = 0.652). Following liver transplantation, long-term survival was also significantly longer for patients drinking coffee (coffee: 61.8 months ± 2.0; 95% CI: 57.9 – 65.8; no coffee: 52.3 months ± 3.5; 95% CI: 45.4 – 59.3; p = 0.001).

Conclusions: Coffee consumption delayed disease progression in ALD and PSC patients with ESLD and increased long-term survival after liver transplantation. We conclude that regular coffee intake should be recommended for these patients.