Eating a healthy diet, such as the Mediterranean diet, has a positive impact on health, but little is known about the effects of including unhealthy foods in an otherwise healthy diet.
In a new study, researchers found diminished benefits of a Mediterranean diet among those with a high frequency of eating unhealthy foods.
They found when it is combined with fried food, sweets, refined grains, red meat, and processed meat, the benefits of eating the Mediterranean part of the diet seem to be diminished.
The research was conducted by a team at Rush University Medical Center.
A Mediterranean diet is linked to lower rates of cognitive decline in older adults. It emphasizes vegetables, fruit, fish, and whole grains.
In the study, the team tested 5,001 older adults living in Chicago who were part of the Chicago Health and Aging Project, an evaluation of cognitive health in adults over the age of 65 conducted from 1993 to 2012.
The researchers analyzed how closely each of the study participants adhered to a Mediterranean diet, which includes daily consumption of fruit, vegetables, legumes, olive oil, fish, potatoes and unrefined cereals, plus moderate wine consumption.
They also assessed how much each participant followed a Western diet, which included fried foods, refined grains, sweets, red and processed meats, full-fat dairy products and pizza.
The researchers then examined the association between Mediterranean diet scores and changes in participants’ global cognitive function, episodic memory and perceptual speed.
They found people with slower cognitive decline over the years of follow-up were those who adhered closest to the Mediterranean diet, along with limiting foods that are part of the Western diet.
But participants who ate more of the Western diet had no beneficial effect of healthy food components in slowing cognitive decline.
Generally, people who had a high Mediterranean diet score compared to those who had the lowest score were equivalent to being 5.8 years younger in age cognitively.
The study also notes that most of the dietary patterns that have shown improvement in cognitive function among older adults, including the Mediterranean, MIND, and DASH diets, have a unique scoring matrix based on the number of servings consumed for each diet component.
The more people can incorporate green leafy vegetables, other vegetables, berries, olive oil, and fish into their diets, the better it is for the aging brains and bodies.
Other studies show that red and processed meat, fried food, and low whole grains intake are linked to higher inflammation and faster cognitive decline in older ages.
To benefit from diets such as the Mediterranean diet, or MIND diet, people would have to limit their consumption of processed foods and other unhealthy foods such as fried foods and sweets.
One author of the study is Puja Agarwal, Ph.D., a nutritional epidemiologist.
The study is published in Alzheimer’s & Dementia: The Journal of the Alzheimer’s Association.
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