For me and probably a lot of other people, their first experience with Irish Coffee was at the Cafe Buena Vista in San Francisco's Fishermen's Wharf area. My first taste was over 25 years ago, and even though I have enjoyed many more Irish coffee's at other bars since then - the Buena Vista ranks as one of the best. http://san-francisco.travelape.com/nightlife/buena-vista-cafe/
I just got an email from an ex-JW friend in Vermont regarding the benefits of an Irish Coffee
A caffeine and alcohol cocktail similar to an Irish coffee could preventsevere brain damage in stroke victims, new research has revealed. The experimental drug, called caffeinol, has the potency of two cups of strong coffee and a small shot of alcohol. When injected into rats within three hours of an artificially stimulated stroke, brain damage was cut by up to 80 per cent.
Neurologist James Grotta and colleagues from the University of Texas-Houston Medical School have also now demonstrated the safety of caffeinol in a small pilot study in patients who suffered ischaemic strokes, when the artery to the brain becomes blocked and cuts off the blood supply.
"Our goal was to see if we could safely achieve the same blood levels of caffeinol that we achieved in our animal studies," Grotta said. "We discovered that we could use even lower doses than we used in the animal studies and still achieve the blood levels that were neuroprotective in
animals."
Martin Brown, an expert in stroke medicine at University College London,told New Scientist: "It's a very exciting approach but we will have to wait and see how further clinical trials go. It's encouraging they've
managed to produce the same levels in humans." Drugs that work in animals often fail because humans cannot tolerate the required doses.
Working together
The researchers are unclear how caffeinol protects the brain after stroke, but the rat experiments showed that neither caffeine nor alcohol offered protection alone. In fact, alcohol alone actually caused more damage.
Brown says alcohol is known to widen blood vessels, which might help. Caffeine can also act on blood vessel when treating migraines. Brown speculates that the combination might interfere with the harmful
biochemical reactions triggered in cells by stroke.
The idea of mixing alcohol and caffeine was "serendipitous", Grotta told HealthScoutNews. Grotta's colleague Roger Strong was aware of the association between moderate use of alcohol and reduced stroke damage, "so we started fooling around with combinations of it with other things."
The team will now assess the effectiveness of the drug in a larger group of patients. Caffeinol will also be combined with a "thermo-cooling" method -which cools the brain of stroke patients to reduce brain damage.
Furthermore, caffeinol can be safely given to patients taking clot-busting drugs to ease the flow of blood to the brain, say the researchers. However, they ruefully note that having a cup of Irish coffee every day to prevent stroke damage will not work. http://www.newscientist.com/news/news.jsp?id=ns99993619
Note to self - OK cancel the trip to the Buena Vista, however, in addition to red wine, I may start drinking (in moderation) Bushmill's again. http://www.bushmills.com/
Cheers!
Mak