Some of us might find it very difficult to keep up with the swift pacing of our daily lives. Our school or work demands tight deadlines and lots of tasks to accomplish. On top of these, we also have other responsibilities to attend to. How can we boost our productivity to meet all these demands? Have you ever considered using smart drugs like modafinil? How about coffee and its energizing caffeine?
Encountering these fast-paced environments is inevitable. Staying up late to meet requirements can lead to a cycle of sleepiness due to constant sleep loss. If this continues, your cognitive performance and wakefulness will take a toll on your motivation and productivity. If you struggle with battling sleepiness that impedes your productivity, stimulants can surely help you!
Stimulants are a wide range of beneficial substances that can keep you awake and productive. These are usually safe and effective in helping you battle that sleepy feeling. Short-term use of stimulants can delay your need to sleep and help you stay awake. However, note that these will not replace the need for actual sleep!
Let us talk about modafinil and coffee, a smart drug and a caffeine-infused beverage, respectively. These two are stimulants that can be your aid in your fast-paced life. If you want to understand what they are, how they work, this article will answer it for you! You will also know how modafinil versus caffeine compares to each other.
What are Modafinil and Coffee?
Reaching out for stimulants can surely help you get through a toxic workday or an all-nighter. With stimulants such as modafinil and coffee, you can keep yourself awake and focused. However, there will be some differences between these two and choosing between them is up to your personal preference.
Modafinil
Pharmaceutical companies have been able to produce remarkable medicines that help address common problems of their users. Modafinil is an FDA-approved drug mainly prescribed to aid individuals with conditions such as narcolepsy, obstructive sleep apnea, and shift sleep disorder. The oral medicine modafinil can work on these conditions because it can help promote alertness in cases of excessive sleepiness.
Besides battling sleepiness, modafinil is also shown to help boost one’s focus, memory retention and reduce that tired feeling. If you are healthy, can you still utilize modafinil’s benefits? Yes, you can! Healthy adults, especially students and night shift workers, use modafinil to improve their performance. It helps them stay awake, productive, focused, and memory retentive.
Coffee (Caffeine)
Another stimulant that may be helpful for you is caffeine. This is a very common substance in your daily cup of coffee. Coffee is a beverage resulting from brewing the soluble components of a coffee bean.
Each brew of coffee is different! They have different tastes, textures, aroma, and caffeine content. The active component of coffee is caffeine. This is the bitter and crystalline component that is extracted during the brewing process.
Caffeine also stimulates your mind and body to be more awake because it can affect many of your body systems. Even though coffee is not regulated as a stimulant, note that consuming huge sums of caffeine is not good for your health! It can lead to mental and physical dependence that is very difficult to withdraw from.
There are instances where athletes and people with conditions such as asthma and gallbladder problems use caffeine. However, these therapeutic uses do not have medical evidence to support them.
Despite these, the acceptance of people to caffeine does not change. A morning cup of coffee is an everyday routine for most of us! Similarly, drinking coffee for leisure is also very common.
If you think that modafinil is the medicine form of caffeine, you might be mistaken. Even though they have very similar effects on your body, their mechanism of inducing such effects is very different!
Understanding the Effects of Modafinil and Coffee
Modafinil and coffee do have almost similar effects on your body. Modafinil is a drug taken as tablets, while caffeine is infused in the cup of coffee that you drink.
Despite being both stimulants, modafinil versus caffeine offers a lot of differences in how they work.
The smart drug modafinil is dubbed as such because it enhances cognition and its sleep-reducing effects. Modafinil’s mechanism of action remains inconclusive. However, theories suggest that it can help address sleepiness because it releases relevant hormones in the brain that inhibit REM sleep. Moreover, modafinil can increase the flow of blood to the brain. Because of this, more oxygen and food source are supplied, hence is a potent brain booster and memory enhancer.
On the other hand, caffeine works differently from modafinil! Caffeine targets and binds to the adenosine receptors. Adenosine is highly contributory to feeling sleepy. As caffeine binds here, you will feel more awake and alert.
When you compare modafinil’s and caffeine’s effects on the body, they are very similar. Both can give you a productivity and alertness boost, better focus, and increased memory retention. Extreme fatigue can also be lessened by caffeine and modafinil.
However, modafinil will not give you some side effects associated with caffeine intake. Caffeine will make you feel anxious, shaky and can make you palpitate.
Modafinil vs Caffeine: Comparing their Cost
Caffeine and modafinil are both available in the market. Caffeine is, obviously, more accessible and cheaper compared to modafinil. You can brew your own or buy a ready-to-drink coffee filled with caffeine at your local grocery stores or coffee shops. The price of these varies depending on where you buy them!
In contrast, modafinil is popularly purchased in legitimate online shops. These can be shipped to any location. However, a 200-milligram dosage can cost you around $10 to $12, depending on the store and quantity. Bulk buying will give you more discounts.
As we can see, modafinil costs a lot more compared to caffeine. In terms of cost measured by their effectiveness, which is more worth comparing modafinil versus caffeine?
The answer here depends on your needs and your body’s response to each. Of course, we all want that boost in our cumbersome work and school load. If the cheaper caffeine option gets you through your day successfully without unwanted side effects, then it is best to stick with it.
However, try the more costly modafinil option if you want to use another potent stimulant or consume modafinil to quit caffeine. Replacing coffee with modafinil is sometimes an option because coffee causes severe palpitations or anxiety to some.
Can You Mix Modafinil with Caffeine?
There are just some days where we are extra tired and sleepy, but we cannot rest just yet due to the onslaught of even more work or deadlines! Mixing modafinil and coffee can be very tempting for people who want an even more potent boost to battle sleepiness and maintain productivity.
Previously, we learned how these two stimulants work. Modafinil-caffeine interaction can work together to stimulate your wake-sleep system better. Hence, mixing caffeine and modafinil intake is possible!
If you want to maximize the alertness boost and cognitive benefits of these two stimulants, the maximum recommendation is taking 200 milligrams of modafinil with at most 2 cups of coffee. These two cups have 200 milligrams of caffeine that will surely keep you alert. Note that you can only do this up to two times a week.
Be aware of the coffee and modafinil interactions when taken together. It is best to avoid drinking modafinil with coffee daily because it may cause side effects such as difficulty sleeping, palpitations, or anxiety.
Taking Coffee After Using Modafinil
Some of us feel incomplete without the first cup of coffee before work or school. If you plan to take coffee after taking a modafinil pill, it would be best to drink coffee very slowly. This helps you prevent getting too much caffeine in your system for a short time. Hence, side effects can be minimized.
Moreover, when you take both coffee and modafinil, try starting at a low modafinil dosage or fewer cups of coffee. This way, you can try first which combination is best for you. Once you found your most effective combination, you can stick to that!
Coffee can increase your trips to the bathroom to urinate, but it does not always mean removing the modafinil’s active component in your body. Once you drink the modafinil pill, it takes 30 to 60 minutes before you feel its effects. Then, it stays in your body and induces such effects for around 12 hours.
Modafinil vs Caffeine on Narcolepsy
By now, you are aware of the effects of modafinil and caffeine on remaining awake. But did you know that there are medical conditions where one has uncontrollable sleepiness? This condition is narcolepsy, and there is no known cure for such! Doctors only prescribe medications that can manage the symptoms.
Stimulants are the best substances that aid narcoleptic patients. When comparing modafinil versus caffeine, which is more effective on narcoleptic patients?
Stimulating the central nervous system is the best way to keep narcoleptic patients awake. Several studies proved that prescribed modafinil could improve the symptoms of narcoleptic patients. However, side effects like nausea are common.
In contrast, caffeine, in theory, can also be beneficial. However, there is no medical study that fully supports it. Hence, the benefits of caffeine on narcoleptic patients remain unclear. Future studies will help us know the answer to this.
Modafinil vs Coffee: Which Should You Choose?
Both coffee and modafinil offer the same benefits to healthy individuals. They will keep you awake, help you study better, and help you focus for a more extended period. Now, we will settle the argument between modafinil versus caffeine to choose the one for you.
Let’s Look at Modafinil First
Lots of research support the cognitive and wakefulness benefits of modafinil. This smart drug is also proven to give you lesser chances of experiencing side effects. Moreover, using modafinil tablets can help you control when you need that productivity boost.
It is not surprising to see how many students or workers get enticed to use modafinil regularly. However, a common disadvantage of this is procurement and price. Students might not be able to afford such medicine, especially for consistent and long-term usage.
And What about Caffeine?
On the other hand, caffeine is relatively cheaper and more accessible. This makes it very easy to quickly grab a cup of coffee on your way to work or school. Caffeine is also not regulated in the market. Therefore, you can always purchase it without restrictions!
The very easy procurement of coffee is a double-edged sword. It becomes common to take excessive and unhealthy amounts of it without noticing! Too much caffeine is proven to cause nausea, nervousness, sleep problems, and increased heart rate.
So Which is Better?
If you want to know which is better between modafinil and coffee, the answer depends on you. Modafinil can give you that boost you need for up to 12 hours. However, if you feel very awake and productive even with just a cup of coffee, then there is no need to change to a smart drug like modafinil.
Also, cost plays a vital factor. If you cannot afford modafinil’s more costly option, it would be best to stick to coffee.
Exploring smart drugs is not a bad option to take. You will surely encounter a time where you need more than what a cup of coffee can give you. Hence, modafinil is an effective and safe stimulant that you can try!
Lastly, do not forget that your body gets to decide which is best for you. Try experimenting with which of the two gives you better performance and fewer side effects. And when needed, consult with a doctor!
References:
- Coffee Brewing Methods
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— Narcolepsy - WellRX
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— Comparing Caffeine vs Modafinil - WebMD
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— The Effect of Caffeine on the Narcoleptic Patients - PubMed
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— Modafinil for narcolepsy: systematic review and meta-analysis
— Modafinil vs. caffeine: effects on fatigue during sleep deprivation - NCBI
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