Effects of Caffeine and Coffee on Women’s Health: Fertility, Menopause, Breast and Uterine Health

Women share unique physiological processes and lifecycle transitions related to their hormonal systems and physical bodies. Women suffer from many of the same diseases as men, and some conditions, like cardiovascular disease, affect women at high rates with devastating consequences. But many health challenges are faced only by women. Some of these have to do with sexual organs and hormonal systems, others center on the processes of mothering, menstruation and menopause. In regards to caffeine and coffee drinking, caffeine affects women differently. Women not only have a greater sensitivity to caffeine than men, but they also may take much longer to detoxify caffeine and recover from its stimulating effects. It is suggested that caffeine’s influence on a variety of conditions in a women’s body may be due to its demonstrated effect on the body’s sex hormones. One of the actions of caffeine is that it causes increases in estrones, or female hormones, while it decreases available testosterone.