Spending on vegetable and fruit consumption could reduce all-cause mortality among older adults

Abstract

BackgroundFew studies have evaluated the linkage between food cost and mortality among older adults. This study considers the hypothesis that greater food expenditure in general, and particularly on more nutritious plant and animal-derived foods, decreases mortality in older adults.MethodsThis study uses the 1999–2000 Elderly Nutrition and Health Survey in Taiwan and follows the cohort until 2008, collecting 24-hr dietary recall data for 1781 participants (874 men and 907 women) aged 65 y or older. Using monthly mean national food prices and 24-hr recall, this study presents an estimate of daily expenditures for vegetable, fruit, animal-derived, and grain food categories. Participants were linked to the national death registry.ResultsOf the 1781 original participants, 625 died during the 10-y follow-up period. Among the 4 food categories, the fourth and fifth expenditure quintiles for vegetables and for fruits had the highest survival rates. After adjusting for co-variates, higher (Q4) vegetable and higher fruit (Q4) food expenditures referent to Q1 were significantly predictive of reduced mortality (HR = 0.55, 95% CI: 0.39-0.78 and HR = 0.64, 95% CI: 0.42–0.99, respectively) and the risk decreased by 12% and 10% for every NT$15 (US$0.50) increase in their daily expenditures. Animal-derived and grain food spending was not predictive of mortality.ConclusionGreater and more achievable vegetable and fruit affordability may improve food security and longevity for older adults.

Association between inflammatory potential of diet and mortality among women in the Swedish Mammography Cohort

“…As mentioned previously, there are various dietary factors that have different effects on inflammation; for example, red meat consumption increases inflammation while green leafy vegetables reduce inflammation [43,44]. In support of our findings, previous work in the SMC examining diet and mortality, have shown significant inverse associations between anti-inflammatory food parameters such as fruits and vegetables [72], which is consistent with results from other studies such as ARIC [73], 2001-2008 Health Surveys for England [74], and a cohort in Taiwan [75]. Previous analyses in the SMC also have shown increasing vitamin C and selenium intake to be inversely associated with breast cancerrelated mortality [76,77], and consumption of red meat was associated with shorter overall survival [78].…”

The Association of Health Literacy with Physical Activity and Nutritional Behavior in Older Adults, and Its Social Cognitive Mediators

“…However, health behaviors such as physical activity (Brovold, Skelton, & Bergland, 2013;Dhaliwal, Welborn, & Howat, 2013) and fruit and vegetable consumption (Lo, Chang, Wahlqvist, Huang, & Lee, 2012;Södergren, McNaughton, Salmon, Ball, & Crawford, 2012), strongly predict health outcomes. Some crosssectional surveys suggest that inadequate health literacy is associated with health risk behaviors such as smoking, alcohol use, insufficient physical activity, and insufficient fruit and vegetable intake (Adams et al, 2013;Wolf, Gazmararian, & Baker, 2007), but another survey reported only weak associations between adequate health literacy and healthy eating practices (Speirs, Messina, Munger, & Grutzmacher, 2012).…”

Whole-Grain Intake and Mortality from All Causes, Cardiovascular Disease, and Cancer: A Systematic Review and Dose-Response Meta-Analysis of Prospective Cohort Studies

“…Two studies (25,26) that did not separate risk ratios for fatal myocardial infarction (MI) from nonfatal MI also were excluded from this study. The study by Lo et al (27) was not included because these researchers considered grain consumption (including whole grains, refined grains, and legumes) rather than whole grains individually. Three studies (28)(29)(30) were excluded because of the inclusion of both refined and whole grains as "cereals" in their analyses.…”