The Relation between Caffeine Consumption and Endometriosis: An Updated Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis

Konstantinos S. Kechagias, Konstantinos Katsikas Triantafyllidis, Margarita Kyriakidou, Panagiotis Giannos, Ilkka Kalliala, Areti Angeliki Veroniki, Maria Paraskevaidi, Maria Kyrgiou
Nutrients · 2021 · vol. 13(10) , pp. 3457 · doi:10.3390/nu13103457 · PMID:34684458 · W3204687324
review OA: gold CC0 ⤵ 11 in-corpus citations
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⚙ AI-generated summary by claude@2026-06, 2026-06-07 ⓘ

This meta-analysis found no significant association between overall caffeine consumption and endometriosis risk, though high intake was linked to an increased risk.

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Abstract

While the contributing factors leading to endometriosis remain unclear, its clinical heterogeneity suggests a multifactorial causal background. Amongst others, caffeine has been studied extensively during the last decade as a putative contributing factor. In this systematic review and meta-analysis, we provide an overview/critical appraisal of studies that report on the association between caffeine consumption and the presence of endometriosis. In our search strategy, we screened PubMed and Scopus for human studies examining the above association. The main outcome was the relative risk of endometriosis in caffeine users versus women consuming little or no caffeine (300 mg/day) or moderate (100–300 mg/day). Ten studies were included in the meta-analysis (five cohort and five case-control studies). No statistically significant association was observed between overall caffeine consumption and risk for endometriosis (RR 1.12, 95% confidence interval (CI) 0.97–1.28, I2 = 70%) when compared to little or no (<100 mg/day) caffeine intake. When stratified according to level of consumption, high intake was associated with increased risk of endometriosis (RR 1.30, 95%CI 1.04–1.63, I2 = 56%), whereas moderate intake did not reach nominal statistical significance (RR 1.18, 95%CI 0.99–1.40, I2 = 37%). In conclusion, caffeine consumption does not appear to be associated with increased risk for endometriosis. However, further research is needed to elucidate the potential dose-dependent link between caffeine and endometriosis or the probable role of caffeine intake as a measurement of other unidentified biases.

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Condition tags

mesh:D004715endometriosis

MeSH descriptors

Caffeine Disease Susceptibility Endometriosis Adult Caffeine Caffeine Coffee Coffee Drinking Endometriosis Female Humans Odds Ratio Publication Bias Risk Assessment Risk Factors

Citation neighborhood

Papers in the corpus that this work cites (lower rings, blue) and that cite this one (upper rings, green). Dot size scales with the paper's in-corpus citation count — bigger dot = more influential within the endo/adeno field. Click a dot to open that paper. [ expand to 2 hops ] — adds papers reached through this work's immediate citers/citees. Heavier; up to 60 extra dots.

References (40)

Cited by (11)

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