This Just In: Alcohol Intake & Longevity; Mediterranean Diet; Dairy Consumption

Drinking Less Alcohol May Help You Live Longer

People who consume no more than three drinks a week live longer than people who drink four or more per week, according to a study published in Alcoholism: Clinical & Experimental Research, Oct. 3, 2018. Researchers evaluated self-reported data from more than 340,000 people in the National Health Interview Survey and outpatient medical records for more than 93,000 Veterans Health Administration patients. They compared drinking frequency with all causes of death. Their analysis showed the least risk of death among those who drank 3.2 or fewer drinks per week. The risk was the same for people who drank 4-7 drinks as for people who drank more than 7.

 

Mediterranean Diet May Help Reduce Stroke Risk

Researchers studied self-reported data from more than 23,000 people ages 40 to 77 (55 percent women) in the European Prospective Investigation into Cancer study. Those who followed a Mediterranean dietary plan had a lower risk of stroke than those who didn’t, and women following the plan had a lower risk than men. The people who most closely followed a Mediterranean diet also were less likely to smoke and more likely to engage in physical activity. Women on the diet also tended to be younger, had higher education levels and lower body mass indices, and reported less use of hypertension medications than men. The study was published in the journal Stroke, Sept. 20, 2018.

Dairy Consumption May Help with Heart Health

People who consumed at least two servings per day of dairy—milk or yogurt, either high-fat or low-fat—had a lower incidence of death and heart disease events than people who consumed no dairy, according to a study published in The Lancet, Sept. 11, 2018. However, the researchers found that cheese had no impact. Analyses were conducted on data from more than 136,000 people ages 35 to 70 from 21 countries registered in the Prospective Urban Rural Epidemiology study. The 2015-2020 Dietary Guidelines for Americans suggests that adults on a 2,000-calorie-a-day diet consume three servings of low-fat or fat-free dairy daily.

Polyunsaturated Fats in Diet Linked to Healthier Aging

Polyunsaturated fats (PUFAs), which are found in plant-based oils, as well as fatty fish such as salmon, sardines, mackerel, and tuna, help people age more healthfully, according to research published in The BMJ, Oct. 17, 2018. The study defined healthy aging as having no chronic diseases, including cardiovascular disease, chronic kidney disease, cancer, or lung disease. Slightly more than 2,600 adults (63.4 percent women) were recruited and given clinical examinations between 1989 and 1993. Then, follow-up phone interviews were conducted through 2015. An analysis showed that the participants who consumed the most PUFAs in their diet had an 18 percent lower risk of unhealthy aging than people who consumed the least amounts of PUFAs.

Healthy Diets Linked to Heart Attack Recovery

Heart attack survivors who consumed unhealthy diets after a heart attack had a higher incidence of death or another hospital stay within one year compared with people who ate healthy diets, according to research published in Journal of the American Heart Association, Sept. 4, 2018. Researchers learned that a lack of certain micronutrients played a significant role in participants’ ability to recover from heart attacks. They collected four-day food diaries from 246 people who had previously suffered and survived a heart attack, and then followed them for a year to determine their continued survival rates. The researchers found that a deficiency in multiple micronutrients—with the highest deficiency being greater than seven micronutrients—led to a higher number of returned hospital visits and death. The most common deficiencies were calcium, folate, magnesium, zinc, and vitamins C, D, E, and K. Nearly a third of participants suffered from a hospital readmission or death, and among them, nearly 45 percent had high micronutrient deficiency.

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