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From Bicycling
According to a
new study published in the journal
Neurology, how you combine certain foods together in your diet that could raise your risk of dementia.
People in the study who developed
dementia
were more likely to combine highly processed meats—such as sausages and
cured meats—with starchy foods like potatoes, alcohol, and sugary
snacks such as cookies and cakes.
The biggest takeaway? It’s best to consume a diverse diet that offers a combination of
healthy nutrients, including vitamins, polyphenols, and carotenoids from plant foods, as well as good fats and protein.
An abundance of previous research has linked less-than-healthy foods like
sugary snacks and deep-fried anything with poorer
brain health compared to those who opt for healthier choices. But a
new study in the journal
Neurology suggests that what foods you eat together can be important when it comes to your risk of
dementia.
Researchers
asked 1,522 participants to complete a comprehensive dietary survey in
2002, including a qualitative food frequency questionnaire. At a
followup 12 years later, they looked at 209 participants who had
developed dementia, as well as 418 people who did not.
They used
the data to create “food networks,” which identified what type of foods
were eaten most in combination, and whether those groups of foods were
substantially different between those who had dementia and those who
didn’t.
Researchers found that the people who developed dementia were more likely to combine
highly processed meats—such as sausages and cured meats—with starchy foods like potatoes, alcohol, and sugary snacks such as cookies and cakes.
“Processed
meat appeared very central in their diet, which means it was connected
with many foods,” lead author Cecilia Samieri, Ph.D., an epidemiologist
at the University of Bordeaux, told
Bicycling. “Worse eating habits toward processed meats and snacking were evident years before dementia diagnosis. In contrast, diverse and
healthy diets appear to decrease the risk of developing dementia.”
In other words, it wasn’t the processed meat on its own that seemed
problematic, she said, but the way its consumption was connected with so
many other items that are considered less healthy, such as pasta, jam,
and potatoes. (It’s worth noting, however, that athletes like cyclists
can benefit from using
these foods as fuel when fast-acting carbs and sugars are necessary to prevent from
bonking on a long ride.)
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The
study does have some limitations though. Most notably, it required
participants to recall what they ate rather than have their consumption
monitored by researchers. Also, it did not track diet patterns over
time, to see if changes made any difference.
Even with those
caveats, the study does provide good evidence about the importance of
diet diversity, according to the study’s coauthor, Abhijeet Sonawane,
Ph.D., a research fellow in medicine at Harvard Medical School.
“Diversity is likely protective because it provides a combination of
healthy nutrients, including vitamins, polyphenols, and carotenoids from plant foods, as well as
good fats and
protein,” he told
Bicycling. “People
in our study who did not develop dementia were more likely to have a
lot of diversity in their diets, and that included healthier foods.”
Well possibly it was not the combination of processed meat and carbs, sugars, alcohol etc, but the fact that the person ATE a lot of carbs, sugars, and drank alcohol that was the real issue.
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