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Association of the Mediterranean Dietary Approaches to Stop Hypertension Intervention for Neurodegenerative Delay (MIND) Diet With the Risk of Dementia
Hui Chen2023
Klodian DhanaYuhui Huang
Top 5% · 95th percentile
146 citations · Public Health, Environmental and Occupational Health
Open Access

TLDR

Eating a diet rich in vegetables, berries, and healthy fats, like the MIND diet, is linked to a lower chance of getting dementia as people age.

Summary

1 Study Aim

The primary aim of this paper is to find out if following the Mediterranean-Dietary Approaches to Stop Hypertension (DASH) Intervention for Neurodegenerative Delay (MIND) diet lowers the risk of developing dementia. The researchers want to see if people who stick closely to the MIND diet are less likely to get dementia as they get older. Simply put: The study wants to know if eating a certain healthy diet can help prevent dementia.

2 Study Design

The research uses data from three large groups of adults: the Whitehall II study, the Health and Retirement Study, and the Framingham Heart Study Offspring cohort. All participants were middle-aged or older and did not have dementia at the start. The researchers measured how closely each person followed the MIND diet using food questionnaires, giving each a score from 0 to 15. They then tracked who developed dementia over time. The study also includes a meta-analysis, which combines results from 11 similar studies, totaling over 224,000 people. Simply put: The study looked at lots of older adults, checked what they ate, and watched to see who got dementia.

3 Findings

The study demonstrates that people with higher MIND diet scores had a lower risk of developing dementia. For every 3-point increase in the MIND diet score, the risk of dementia dropped by about 17%. This link was seen in men and women, across different ages, and regardless of smoking or body weight. The meta-analysis confirmed these results, showing that those who followed the MIND diet most closely had a lower risk of dementia than those who did not. The authors suggest that eating according to the MIND diet may help protect against dementia, but more research is needed to see if the diet should be adjusted for different groups of people. Simply put: People who ate more foods from the MIND diet were less likely to get dementia.

Abstract

Importance: Dementia threatens the well-being of older adults, making efforts toward prevention of great importance. Objective: To evaluate the association of the Mediterranean-Dietary Approaches to Stop Hypertension (DASH) Intervention for Neurodegenerative Delay (MIND) diet with the risk of dementia in 3 prospective studies and a meta-analysis. Design, Setting, and Participants: Cohort analyses included the Whitehall II study (WII), the Health and Retirement Study (HRS), and the Framingham Heart Study Offspring cohort (FOS), and the meta-analysis included 11 cohort studies. Participants were middle-aged and older women and men from WII in 2002 to 2004, HRS in 2013, and FOS in 1998 to 2001 without dementia at the study baseline. Data were analyzed from May 25 to September 1, 2022. Exposures: MIND diet score was measured using food frequency questionnaires, and scores ranged from 0 to 15, with a higher score indicating higher adherence to the MIND diet. Main Outcome and Measures: Incident all-cause dementia, with cohort-specific definitions. Results: Included in this study were 8358 participants (mean [SD] age, 62.2 [6.0] years; 5777 male [69.1%]) from WII, 6758 participants (mean [SD] age, 66.5 [10.4] years; 3965 female [58.7%]) from HRS, and 3020 participants (mean [SD] age, 64.2 [9.1] years; 1648 female [54.6%]) from FOS. The mean (SD) baseline MIND diet score was 8.3 (1.4) in WII, 7.1 (1.9) in HRS, and 8.1 (1.6) in FOS. Over 166 516 person-years, a total of 775 participants (220 in WII, 338 in HRS, and 217 in FOS) developed incident dementia. In the multivariable-adjusted Cox proportional hazard model, higher MIND diet score was associated with lower risk of dementia (pooled hazard ratio [HR] for every 3-point increment, 0.83; 95% CI, 0.72-0.95; P for trend = .01; I2 = 0%). The associations were consistently observed in subgroups defined by sex, age, smoking status, and body mass index. In the meta-analysis of 11 cohort studies with 224 049 participants (5279 incident dementia cases), the highest tertile of MIND diet score was associated with lower risk of dementia compared with the lowest tertile (pooled HR, 0.83; 95% CI, 0.76-0.90; I2 = 35%). Conclusions and Relevance: Results suggest that adherence to the MIND diet was associated with lower risk of incident dementia in middle-aged and older adults. Further studies are warranted to develop and refine the specific MIND diet for different populations.

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