Caffeine Withdrawal Symptoms

Headaches, fatigue, lack of energy and difficulty concentrating. Would you agree those are the classic symptoms of caffeine withdrawal?

Researchers from the University of Vermont College of Medicine and colleagues at Johns Hopkins School of Medicine investigated the biological mechanisms of caffeine withdrawal.

The study was double-blind. The participants didn’t know if they were receiving caffeine or a placebo. For real caffeine addicts, wouldn’t that be a crazy experience?

Participants’ responses to the caffeine or placebo were measured in three ways: brain electrical activity via electroencephalogram (EEG); blood flow velocity in the brain via ultrasound; and participants’ self-reports of subjective effects via questionnaires.

Findings:

Eliminating daily caffeine consumption produced changes in cerebral blood flow velocity and quantitative EEG  likely related to caffeine withdrawal symptoms of headache, drowsiness and decreased alertness.

Acute caffeine abstinence increased brain blood flow, possibly accounting for withdrawal headaches. Changes in EEG were linked to fatigue. Participants also reported increases in measures of “tired,” “fatigue,” “sluggish” and “weary.” The researchers believe that the findings provide the “most rigorous demonstration to date of physiological effects of caffeine withdrawal.”

An unexpected finding: There were no net benefits associated with chronic caffeine administration. Stacey Sigmon, Ph.D was the first author on the study. She said,

“In contrast to what most of us coffee lovers would think, our study showed no difference between when the participant was maintained on chronic placebo and when the participant was stabilized on chronic caffeine administration. What this means is that consuming caffeine regularly does not appear to produce any net beneficial effects, based on the measures we examined.”

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