Kidney Failure and Tea, Alcohol, Tobacco and Coffee

With the continuous improvement of living standards, tea, coffee, tobacco and alcohol have become the necessity in the daily life. However kidney failure patients should stay far away from them.

1. Coffee. Coffee can increase blood pressure and cholesterol, aggravate arteriosclerosis. Too much intake of coffee will cause quick increase of cortisol and epinephrine which will worsen kidney failure. What is more, coffee will cause sleep disorder and this will further lower the immunity.

2. Alcohol. It has been proved that alcohol will cause blood pressure to increase and the more alcohol, the higher incidence of hypertension. Alcohol can also increase the secretion of rennin and inhibit the excretion of uric acid in the kidney, thus increasing the risk of kidney stones. Alcohol can also increase the proteinuria. And it can affect the functions of heart, liver, kidneys, brain and endocrine organs and cause metabolic disorders and imbalances in the body. The intake of coffee and alcohol at the same time has far more harms to health because they have the opposite effects to the brain which can stimulate the blood vessels to expand and increase blood circulation and increase burdens to the heart.

3. Tobacco. Smoking can aggravate high blood pressure, lipid metabolic disorder and artery contraction and these are all harmful to the kidneys. What is more, smoking will cause many diseases in other organs and systems such as respiratory system.

4. Tea. Tea contains caffeine and other active substances which can increase the blood pressure and heartbeat. If patients really want to drink tea, green tea is a good choice which contains less caffeine and more tea polyphenol. Tea polyphenoal can not only eliminate the effects of caffeine but also has the function of diuresis. Therefore kidney failure patients can have tea but should avoid strong tea and green tea is a good choice.