EFFECTS OF DISCONTINUING COFFEE INTAKE ON IRON STATUS OF IRON-DEFICIENT GUATEMALAN TODDLERS - A RANDOMIZED INTERVENTION STUDY

Coffee is one of the first liquids given to infants in Guatemala. To e valuate whether this practice has an adverse effect on iron status, 16 0 children 12-24 mo of age who had received coffee for greater than or equal to 2 mo and had at least one indicator of iron deficiency were stratified by initial hemoglobin concentration (anemic, or nonanemic, ie, hemoglobin greater than or equal to 105 g/L) and randomly assigned to a control (continuation of coffee; coffee) or intervention (provid ed with a substitute consisting of sugar and coloring; substitute) gro up for 5 mo. Anemic children were provided with iron supplements for 2 -3 mo. Hematologic and anthropometric measurements were made before an d after the intervention and dietary and morbidity data were collected every 2 wk. A total of 139 children completed the study: 45 coffee, n onanemic; 56 substitute, nonanemic; 19 coffee, anemic; and 19 substitu te, anemic. Compliance with the procedures was good: median coffee int ake was 891 mL/wk in the coffee group compared with 18 mL/wk in the su bstitute group (P = 0.0001). There was no significant effect of discon tinuing coffee consumption on changes in hemoglobin, hematocrit, ratio of zinc protoporphyrin to heme or plasma iron, zinc or copper in eith er nonanemic or anemic children, or plasma ferritin in children who di d not take iron supplements. In children who took iron supplements, ch ange in plasma ferritin was significantly greater in the substitute gr oup than in the coffee group (106% compared with 1%, P < 0.05). This i mplies that coffee interferes with the utilization of supplemental iro n. It is likely that the amount and strength of coffee consumed by Gua temalan toddlers are too low to significantly affect the other indexes of iron status.