Adherence to Mediterranean Diet Linked to Lower CVD, Mortality in Women

WEDNESDAY, March 15, 2023 (HealthDay News) — For women, adherence to a Mediterranean diet is associated with a reduced risk for cardiovascular disease (CVD) and mortality, according to a review published online March 14 in Heart.

Anushriya Pant, from the University of Sydney, and colleagues examined the association between higher versus lower adherence to a Mediterranean diet and incident CVD and total mortality among women in a systematic review and meta-analysis. The meta-analysis included 16 prospective cohort studies with 722,495 female participants.

The researchers found that higher adherence to a Mediterranean diet was associated with lower CVD incidence, total mortality, and coronary heart disease (hazard ratios [95 percent confidence intervals], 0.76 [0.72 to 0.81], 0.77 [0.74 to 0.80], and 0.75 [0.65 to 0.87], respectively). Women with higher Mediterranean diet adherence had lower stroke incidence, but the reduction was not statistically significant (hazard ratio, 0.87; 95 percent confidence interval, 0.76 to 1.01).

“Future research might consider adding more studies that look at the dietary impact on stroke, and subgroup analyses that address female specific cardiovascular risk factors, menopausal status and ethnicity, as well as individual participant data meta-analyses,” the authors write.