Well, before we get to the worry bit, the first question is where we encounter this “drug”. It’s actually a lot more common than you might imagine. Obviously it’s in coffee and tea, as well as cocoa beans and kola nuts. For the record, you should ignore the label on coffees claiming they are decaffeinated. At best, the level of caffeine is reduced but it’s never eliminated. So you find it in a vast range of drinks, foods, and in over-the-counter painkillers and the pills we pop when we have a cold. It’s even an ingredient in some diet pills. Yes, you guessed it. Although it’s not addictive in the same sense as most street drugs, it’s a stimulant. We like the effect it has on our bodies and brains. The withdrawal symptoms, however, are usually mild and only last a day or two if you do go cold turkey.
The problem for our purposes is that it causes the blood vessels to contract. In turn, the heart must beat more quickly to push the same amount of blood round the body and pressure rises. It was confirmed, however, that there is no link between caffeine and any of the major symptoms of heart disease, nor is an irregular heartbeat encouraged, following extensive clinical tests.
If you already have high blood pressure, you should talk with your regular physician about cutting back on your caffeine intake. The fact that might make you less alert and cause a loss in the level of concentration is a small price to pay in reducing the risk of a stroke.
However, there’s absolutely no evidence that caffeine affects your sexual performance. This is good news for those heavy coffee drinkers, but there’s one slight problem. Erectile dysfunction is most often caused by a hardening of the arteries. Cialis works by encouraging the arteries to dilate. If caffeine causes a contraction in the arteries, you should drink less of it when you take Cialis. This is purely a precaution and may improve your general health if you already have high blood pressure.