Dietary patterns, Mediterranean diet, and cardiovascular disease
- 31 January 2014
- journal article
- review article
- Published by Ovid Technologies (Wolters Kluwer Health) in Current Opinion in Lipidology
- Vol. 25 (1), 20-26
- https://doi.org/10.1097/MOL.0000000000000044
Abstract
Purpose of reviewThe objective of this manuscript was to review the evidence on the association between adherence to a Mediterranean diet (MeDiet) and the risk of cardiovascular disease (CVD). We also updated the results of the last available meta-analysis.Recent findingsIn 2013, a landmark study in the field, the PREvencion con DIeta MEDiterranea randomized trial, with 7447 high-risk participants, published its final results. They provided a strong support to the beneficial role of a traditional MeDiet for primary cardiovascular prevention. When these results were combined with those of the Lyon Diet Heart Study (a secondary prevention trial), we found that an intervention with a MeDiet was associated with a 38% relative reduction in the risk of CVD clinical events (pooled random-effects risk ratio: 0.62; 95% confidence interval, CI: 0.45-0.85). Regarding observational studies assessing clinical end-points as outcome, we identified seven new cohort studies published after the last meta-analysis. After removing studies that only assessed fatal outcomes, a two-point increase in adherence to the MeDiet (0-9 score) was associated with a significant reduction in cardiovascular events (pooled risk ratio: 0.87; 95% CI: 0.85-0.90) with no evidence of heterogeneity.SummaryConsistent evidence suggests that the promotion of the Mediterranean dietary pattern is an effective and feasible tool for the prevention of CVD.This publication has 34 references indexed in Scilit:
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