Skip to main content

Coffee Consumption and Melanoma: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis of Observational Studies

American Journal of Clinical Dermatology volume 17, pages 113–123 (2016)Cite this article

Abstract

Background

Laboratory and animals studies have suggested a possible protective effect of coffee consumption on the development of melanoma. However, the results of epidemiological studies investigating this association have been inconclusive.

Objective

A systematic review and meta-analysis of published studies was conducted to evaluate any association between coffee consumption and melanoma.

Methods

Observational studies were searched for in MEDLINE, EMBASE, and the Cochrane Central Register from inception to September 1, 2015. The Meta-analysis Of Observational Studies in Epidemiology (MOOSE) guidelines were followed in conducting this study.

Results

We identified nine observational studies with a total of 927,173 study participants, of which 3787 had melanoma. With random-effects modeling, the pooled relative risks (RR) for melanoma among regular coffee drinkers was 0.75 (95 % confidence interval [CI] 0.63–0.89, p = 0.001) compared with controls. Visual inspection of a funnel plot suggested publication bias, although Egger’s test (p = 0.981) delineated no small-study effects. The pooled relative risks for melanoma among decaffeinated coffee drinkers was, however, not statistically significant at 0.92 (95 % CI 0.82–1.05, p = 0.215).

Conclusion

There is some evidence for the beneficial effects of regular coffee consumption on melanoma. More prospective cohort studies with systematic quantification of coffee consumption would be necessary to further elucidate this association.

This is a preview of subscription content, access via your institution.

Access options

Buy single article

Instant access to the full article PDF.

USD 49.95

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Fig. 1
Fig. 2
Fig. 3
Fig. 4

References

  1. American Cancer Society. What are the key statistics about melanoma skin cancer? 2014. Available at: http://www.cancer.org/cancer/skincancer-melanoma/detailedguide/melanoma-skin-cancer-key-statistics. Last accessed 1 April 2015.

  2. Surveillance, Epidemiology, and End Results Program. SEER Stat Fact Sheets: melanoma of the skin. 2015. Available at: http://seer.cancer.gov/statfacts/html/melan.html. Last accessed 2 April 2015.

  3. Armstrong BK, Kricker A. How much melanoma is caused by sun exposure? Melanoma Res. 1993;3:395–401.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  4. Uzarska M, Czajkowski R, Schwartz RA, Bajek A, Zegarska B, Drewa T. Chemoprevention of skin melanoma: facts and myths. Melanoma Res. 2013;23:426–33.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  5. Heffernan TP, Kawasumi M, Blasina A, Anderes K, Conney AH, Nghiem P. ATR-Chk1 pathway inhibition promotes apoptosis after UV treatment in primary human keratinocytes: potential basis for the UV protective effects of caffeine. J Invest Dermatol. 2009;129:1805–15.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  6. Han W, Ming M, He YY. Caffeine promotes ultraviolet B-induced apoptosis in human keratinocytes without complete DNA repair. J Biol Chem. 2011;286:22825–32.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  7. Lee KJ, Jeong HG. Protective effects of kahweol and cafestol against hydrogen peroxide-induced oxidative stress and DNA damage. Toxicol Lett. 2007;173:80–7.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  8. Abel EL, Hendrix SO, McNeeley SG, et al. Daily coffee consumption and prevalence of nonmelanoma skin cancer in Caucasian women. Eur J Cancer Prev. 2007;16:446–52.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  9. Miura K, Hughes MC, Green AC, van der Pols JC. Caffeine intake and risk of basal cell and squamous cell carcinomas of the skin in an 11-year prospective study. Eur J Nutr. 2014;53:511–20.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  10. Jacobsen BK, Bjelke E, Kvale G, et al. Coffee drinking, mortality, and cancer incidence: results from a Norwegian prospective study. J Natl Cancer Inst. 1986;76:823–31.

    CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  11. Ferrucci LM, Cartmel B, Molinaro AM, et al. Tea, coffee, and caffeine and early-onset basal cell carcinoma in a case–control study. Eur J Cancer Prev. 2014;23:296–302.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  12. Stroup DF, Berlin JA, Morton SC, et al. Meta-analysis of observational studies in epidemiology: a proposal for reporting. Meta-analysis Of Observational Studies in Epidemiology (MOOSE) group. JAMA. 2000;283:2008–12.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  13. Micha R, Wallace SK, Mozaffarian D. Red and processed meat consumption and risk of incident coronary heart disease, stroke, and diabetes mellitus: a systematic review and meta-analysis. Circulation. 2010;121:2271–83.

    Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  14. Symons MJ, Moore DT. Hazard rate ratio and prospective epidemiological studies. J Clin Epidemiol. 2002;55:893–9.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  15. DerSimonian R, Laird N. Meta-analysis in clinical trials. Control Clin Trials. 1986;7:177–88.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  16. Egger M, Davey Smith G, Schneider M, Minder C. Bias in meta-analysis detected by a simple, graphical test. BMJ. 1997;315:629–34.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  17. Paffenbarger RS Jr, Wing AL, Hyde RT. Characteristics in youth predictive of adult-onset malignant lymphomas, melanomas, and leukemias: brief communication. J Natl Cancer Inst. 1978;60:89–92.

    PubMed  Google Scholar 

  18. Stensvold I, Jacobsen BK. Coffee and cancer: a prospective study of 43,000 Norwegian men and women. Cancer Causes Control. 1994;5:401–8.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  19. Veierød MB, Thelle DS, Laake P. Diet and risk of cutaneous malignant melanoma: a prospective study of 50,757 Norwegian men and women. Int J Cancer. 1997;71:600–4.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  20. Naldi L, Gallus S, Tavani A, Imberti GL, LaVecchia C, Oncology Study Group of the Italian Group for Epidemiologic Research in Dermatology. Risk of melanoma and vitamin A, coffee and alcohol: a case–control study from Italy. Eur J Cancer Prev. 2004;13:503–8.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  21. Nilsson LM, Johansson I, Lenner P, Lindahl B, Van Guelpen B. Consumption of filtered and boiled coffee and the risk of incident cancer: a prospective cohort study. Cancer Causes Control. 2010;21:1533–44.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  22. Song F, Qureshi AA, Han J. Increased caffeine intake is associated with reduced risk of basal cell carcinoma of the skin. Cancer Res. 2012;72:3282–9.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  23. Fortes C, Mastroeni S, Boffetta P, et al. The protective effect of coffee consumption on cutaneous melanoma risk and the role of GSTM1 and GSTT1 polymorphisms. Cancer Causes Control. 2013;24:1779–87.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  24. Wu H, Reeves KW, Qian J, Sturgeon SR. Coffee, tea, and melanoma risk among postmenopausal women. Eur J Cancer Prev. 2014. doi:10.1097/CEJ.0000000000000093.

  25. Loftfield E, Freedman ND, Graubard BI, et al. Coffee drinking and cutaneous melanoma risk in the NIH-AARP diet and health study J Natl Cancer Inst. 2015;107. doi:10.1093/jnci/dju421.

  26. Wu S, Han J, Song F, et al. Caffeine intake, coffee consumption, and risk of cutaneous malignant melanoma. Epidemiology. 2015;26:898–908.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  27. Huber WW. Parzefall W (2005) Modification of N-acetyltransferases and glutathione S-transferases by coffee components: possible relevance for cancer risk. Methods Enzymol. 2005;401:307–41.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  28. Kang NJ, Lee KW, Shin BJ, et al. Caffeic acid, a phenolic phytochemical in coffee, directly inhibits Fyn kinase activity and UVB-induced COX-2 expression. Carcinogenesis. 2009;30:321–30.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  29. Lee KA, Chae JI, Shim JH. Natural diterpenes from coffee, cafestol and kahweol induce apoptosis through regulation of specificity protein 1 expression in human malignant pleural mesothelioma. J Biomed Sci. 2012;19:60. doi:10.1186/1423-0127-19-60.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  30. Cárdenas C, Quesada AR, Medina MA. Anti-angiogenic and anti-inflammatory properties of kahweol, a coffee diterpene. McCormick DL, editor. PLoS One. 2011;6(8):e23407. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0023407.

  31. Denkert C, Kobel M, Berger S, et al. Expression of cyclooxygenase 2 in human malignant melanoma. Cancer Res. 2001;61:303–8.

    CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  32. Goulet AC, Einsphar JG, Alberts DS, et al. Analysis of cyclooxygenase 2 (COX-2) expression during malignant melanoma progression. Cancer Biol Ther. 2003;2:713–8.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  33. Buckman SY, Gresham A, Hale P, et al. COX-2 expression is induced by UVB exposure in human skin: implications for the development of skin cancer. Carcinogenesis. 1998;19:723–9.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  34. Wu W, Tong Y, Zhao Q, Yu G, Wei X, Lu Q. Coffee consumption and bladder cancer: a meta-analysis of observational studies. Sci Rep. 2015;12(5):9051.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  35. Liu H, Hua Y, Zheng X, et al. Effect of coffee consumption on the risk of gastric cancer: a systematic review and meta-analysis of prospective cohort studies. PLoS One. 2015;29(10):e0128501.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  36. Xie Y, Qin J, Nan G, Huang S, Wang Z, Su Y. Coffee consumption and the risk of lung cancer: an updated meta-analysis of epidemiological studies. Eur J Clin Nutr. 2015. doi:10.1038/ejcn.2015.96.

    Google Scholar 

  37. Yang TO, Crowe F, Cairns BJ, Reeves GK, Beral V. Tea and coffee and risk of endometrial cancer: cohort study and meta-analysis. Am J Clin Nutr. 2015;101:570–8.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  38. Merritt MA, Tzoulaki I, Tworoger SS, De Vivo I, Hankinson SE, et al. Investigation of dietary factors and endometrial cancer risk using a nutrient-wide association study approach in the EPIC and Nurses’ Health Study (NHS) and NHSII. Cancer Epidemiol Biomarkers Prev. 2015;24:466–71.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  39. Petrick JL, Freedman ND, Graubard BI, et al. Coffee consumption and risk of hepatocellular carcinoma and intrahepatic cholangiocarcinoma by sex: the liver cancer pooling project. Cancer Epidemiol Biomarkers Prev. 2015;24:1398–406.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  40. Setiawan VW, Wilkens LR, Lu SC, Hernandez BY, Le Marchand L, Henderson BE. Association of coffee intake with reduced incidence of liver cancer and death from chronic liver disease in the US multiethnic cohort. Gastroenterology. 2015;148(1):118–25.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  41. Sang LX, Chang B, Li XH, Jiang M. Consumption of coffee associated with reduced risk of liver cancer: a meta-analysis. BMC Gastroenterol. 2013;25(13):34.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  42. Ferrini RL, Barrett-Connor E. Caffeine intake and endogenous sex steroid levels in postmenopausal women. The Rancho Bernardo Study. Am J Epidemiol. 1996;144:642–4.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  43. Ohata C, Tadokoro T, Itami S. Expression of estrogen receptor beta in normal skin, melanocytic nevi and malignant melanomas. J Dermatol. 2008;35:215–21.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  44. Matsuoka H, Tsubaki M, Yamazoe Y, et al. Tamoxifen inhibits tumor cell invasion and metastasis in mouse melanoma through suppression of PKC/MEK/ERK and PKC/PI3K/Akt pathways. Exp Cell Res. 2009;315:2022–32.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  45. Willett W. Nutritional epidemiology. 1st ed. New York: Oxford University Press; 1990.

    Google Scholar 

  46. Guertin KA, Loftfield E, Boca SM, et al. Serum biomarkers of habitual coffee consumption may provide insight into the mechanism underlying the association between coffee consumption and colorectal cancer. Am J Clin Nutr. 2015;101:1000–11.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. National Skin Centre, 1 Mandalay Road, Singapore, 308205, Singapore

    Yik Weng Yew

  2. Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, Boston, MA, USA

    Yik Weng Yew & Yi Chun Lai

  3. Rutgers New Jersey Medical School, Newark, NJ, USA

    Yi Chun Lai

  4. Dermatology, Preventive Medicine, and Pathology, Rutgers New Jersey Medical School, and Rutgers University School of Public Affairs and Administration, Newark, NJ, USA

    Robert A. Schwartz

Authors
  1. Yik Weng Yew
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Yi Chun Lai
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  3. Robert A. Schwartz
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Yik Weng Yew.

Ethics declarations

Funding

No funding was received for the preparation of this review.

Conflict of interest

Yik Weng Yew, Yi Chun Lai and Robert A. Schwartz have no conflicts of interest.

Additional information

Y. W. Yew and Y. C. Lai are the co-first authors.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and Permissions

About this article

Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this article

Yew, Y.W., Lai, Y.C. & Schwartz, R.A. Coffee Consumption and Melanoma: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis of Observational Studies. Am J Clin Dermatol 17, 113–123 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s40257-015-0165-1

Download citation

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s40257-015-0165-1

Keywords

  • Melanoma
  • Coffee Consumption
  • Cochrane Central Register
  • Relative Risk Estimate
  • Pool Relative Risk