A Cup of Joe: The Secret to Living Longer with Renal Disease

Living with renal disease isn’t always easy. You’ve got to follow a carefully-controlled diet to avoid eating too much sodium, potassium, phosphorus, and protein. Then there’s daily medications and regular doctor’s appointments. And in the back of your mind, you’ve probably wondered if you’ll end up on dialysis or worse.

Besides following a Renal Diet and your doctor’s recommendations, is there anything else you can do to protect your health and live longer?

Yes. And it’s getting some buzz. In a recent study, researchers looked at caffeine consumption for about 5,000 people living with chronic kidney disease. They found that people who drink about 30 to 200 mg of caffeine per day, cut their risk for early death from all causes by about 26 percent.

Ever wondered if drinking coffee is OK when you have renal disease? Based on the findings in the study published in Nephrology Dialysis Transplantation, it appears a cup or two of coffee per day is safe to drink and may even be beneficial.

A standard cup of coffee contains about 95 mg of caffeine. Caffeine is also found in energy drinks, usually in higher amounts, and in some chocolate in smaller amounts. If you’re going to add caffeine to your diet when you have renal disease, pay attention to calories per serving and the amount of liquid you consume

So what goes well with a cup of coffee? Good food. And you’ll find plenty of options to choose from for breakfast, lunch, or dinner on our Renal-Friendly menu, including two recent additions that will make meal prep easy::

• Meal Pack 6 - includes 7 full meals
• Breakfast Meal Pack 2A - includes 7 full meals

Take a look at the full list of renal meals.