Mediterranean diet and mobility decline in older persons

Abstract

We examined whether adherence to a Mediterranean-style diet has positive effects on mobility assessed over a nine-year follow-up in a representative sample of older adults. This research is part of the InCHIANTI Study, a prospective population-based study of older persons in Tuscany, Italy. The sample for this analysis included 935 women and men aged 65 years and older. Adherence to the Mediterranean diet was assessed at baseline by the standard 10-unit Mediterranean diet score (MDS). Lower extremity function was measured at baseline, and at the 3, 6 and 9-year follow-up visits using the Short Physical Performance Battery (SPPB). At baseline, higher adherence to Mediterranean diet was associated with better lower body performance. Participants with higher adherence experienced less decline in SPPB score, which was of 0.9 points higher (p<.0001) at the 3-year-follow, 1.1 points higher (p= 0.0004) at the 6-year follow-up and 0.9 points higher (p= 0.04) at the 9-year follow-up compared to those with lower adherence. Among participants free of mobility disability at baseline, those with higher adherence had a lower risk (HR=0.71,95%CI=0.51–0.98, p=0.04) of developing new mobility disability. High adherence to a Mediterranean-style diet is associated with a slower decline of mobility over time in community dwelling older persons. If replicated, this observation is highly relevant in terms of public health.

Relationship of Low-Circulating “Anti-Aging” Klotho Hormone with Disability in Activities of Daily Living among Older Community-Dwelling Adults

“…Physical activity was dichotomized between inactive, low, and moderate to high. 25 Trained physiotherapists performed a physical assessment of muscle strength, gait, and balance. Lower extremity function was determined using the Short Physical Performance Battery (SPPB).…”

Mediterranean Diet attenuates risk of frailty and sarcopenia: New insights and future directions

“…However, four fulltext articles were duplicate publications: two studies were reported on four occasions in separate articles [73][74][75][76]. Therefore a total of 12 studies were included in this narrative review (see Table 1).…”

“…In a separate analysis of the InCHIANTI study [88] Milaneschi et al [73] reported that participants with higher adherence to a MedDiet (defined as MDS score ≥ 6) were less likely to have mobility disability at baseline (defined as SPPB score <10) even after adjustments for age, gender, energy intake, BMI, MMSE score, physical activity, instrumental activities of daily living, depressive symptoms, number of chronic diseases and medications (OR = 0.50; 95% CI: 0.30-0.82; p = 0.006). Milaneschi et al [73] further reported that participants with greater adherence to a MedDiet experienced significantly less decline in SPPB scores over time (3-year follow-up: 0.9 points higher (SE = 0.2, p ≤ 0.001); 6-year follow-up: 1.1 points higher (SE = 0.3, p = 0.0002); 9-year follow-up: 0.9 points higher (SE = 0.4, p = 0.03)). Using two dietary assessment instruments (MDS and MEDAS) León-Muñoz et al [74] reported that over a mean follow-up period of 3.5 years, an increasing adherence to a MedDiet was associated with decreasing risk of physical frailty.…”

“…Objective measurements including gait speed and muscle strength were also collected [84]. In a separate analysis of the InCHIANTI study [88], Milaneschi et al [73] assessed physical functioning using the Short Physical Performance Battery (SPPB) [89] which evaluates lower extremity function by measuring three domains of physical function that mimic activities of daily living: 1) balance; 2) usual gait speed; 3) chair stands.…”

Instruments to Assess Mobility Limitation in Community-Dwelling Older Adults: A Systematic Review

“…• Walking distance: 2.4 m (Guralnik et al, 1995;Ostir et al, 1998;Shumway-Cook et al, 2003;ShumwayCook et al, 2002), 4 m (Bean et al, 2011;Milaneschi et al, 2010Milaneschi et al, , 2011Patel et al, 2006;Sayers et al, 2006), not specified (Reid et al, 2008; • Score range: 0-12 (Bean et al, 2011;Sayers et al, 2006;Shumway-Cook et al, 2003) or 1-11 (Ostir et al, 1998) • 0-4: severe mobility limitation, 5-9: mild to moderate mobility limitation, and 10-12: good mobility (Milaneschi et al, 2010) • Poor mobility performance ≤ 10 (Milaneschi et al, 2011) • Moderate mobility impairment > 7; severe mobility impairments ≤ 7 (Reid et al, 2008) Carried out in the home by trained interviewers (Guralnik et al, 1995) review demonstrates that there are various mobility assessment tools. These instruments have fallen into two broad categories: selfreport and performance-based measures.…”