Deans' stroke musings: Adherence to the MIND diet and longitudinal brain structural changes over a decade: evidence from the Framingham heart study offspring cohort

Changing stroke rehab and research worldwide now.Time is Brain! trillions and trillions of neurons that DIE each day because there are NO effective hyperacute therapies besides tPA(only 12% effective). I have 523 posts on hyperacute therapy, enough for researchers to spend decades proving them out. These are my personal ideas and blog on stroke rehabilitation and stroke research. Do not attempt any of these without checking with your medical provider. Unless you join me in agitating, when you need these therapies they won't be there.

What this blog is for:

My blog is not to help survivors recover, it is to have the 10 million yearly stroke survivors light fires underneath their doctors, stroke hospitals and stroke researchers to get stroke solved. 100% recovery. The stroke medical world is completely failing at that goal, they don't even have it as a goal. Shortly after getting out of the hospital and getting NO information on the process or protocols of stroke rehabilitation and recovery I started searching on the internet and found that no other survivor received useful information. This is an attempt to cover all stroke rehabilitation information that should be readily available to survivors so they can talk with informed knowledge to their medical staff. It lays out what needs to be done to get stroke survivors closer to 100% recovery. It's quite disgusting that this information is not available from every stroke association and doctors group.

Wednesday, March 18, 2026

Adherence to the MIND diet and longitudinal brain structural changes over a decade: evidence from the Framingham heart study offspring cohort

Ask your competent? doctor for EXACT DIET PROTOCOLS! None of this MIND diet guidelines; they have NO specifics! You need SPECIFICS!

Adherence to the MIND diet and longitudinal brain structural changes over a decade: evidence from the Framingham heart study offspring cohort

http://orcid.org/0000-0003-2866-7811Hui Chen1,2,
Gulisiya Hailili1,
Lu-sha Tong3,
Leqi Fei1,
http://orcid.org/0000-0002-5024-2652Yaying Cao4,
Xin Xu1,
Xue Li1,5,
http://orcid.org/0000-0002-7392-9289Debora Melo van Lent6,7,8,
http://orcid.org/0000-0002-2389-8752Changzheng Yuan1,2

Correspondence to Professor Changzheng Yuan; chy478@zju.edu.cn

Abstract

Background The MIND diet was favourably linked to lower risk of neurodegenerative diseases. While previous cross-sectional studies implied its beneficial associations with brain imaging markers, its associations with long-term brain structural changes remained unclear.

Methods We included 1647 middle-aged and older individuals from the Framingham Heart Study Offspring cohort (FOS). MIND diet score was calculated from a validated FFQ, repeatedly administered at Exams 5, 6, and 7. Brain imaging markers were acquired between 1999 and 2019, with a median repetition (interquartile range, IQR) of 3 (2-3) times. We used linear mixed models to assess the associations of the MIND diet score and its components with longitudinal brain structural changes.

Results Over a median follow-up of 12.3 years (IQR 6.8–13.8 years), greater adherence to the MIND diet was associated with slower decline in total grey matter volume. Specifically, each three-unit increase in the MIND diet score was linked to a 0.279 cm³/year (95% CI 0.089 to 0.469) slower decline in total grey matter volume, corresponding to a 20.1% attenuation in age-related change that was equivalent to 2.5 years of reduced brain ageing during the 12.3-year follow-up. Additionally, higher MIND diet score was associated with slower increases in lateral ventricular volume (−0.071 cm³/year, 95% CI −0.125 to −0.017), notably in the left lateral ventricle (−0.041 cm³/year, 95% CI −0.070 to −0.013), reflecting approximately 8.0% and 8.8% attenuation of age-related changes, equivalent to roughly 1.0 year of delayed brain ageing during follow-up.

Conclusions In this prospective cohort study, greater adherence to the MIND diet was associated with slower brain structural atrophy, particularly regarding grey matter loss and ventricular enlargement. These findings support the potential of the MIND diet as a strategy to support brain health and delay structural brain ageing.

Data availability statement

Data may be obtained from a third party and are not publicly available. The Framingham Heart Study data are shared at the Biologic Specimen and Data Repository Information Coordinating Center (BioLINCC, https://biolincc.nhlbi.nih.gov/home/) on reasonable request.

https://doi.org/10.1136/jnnp-2025-336957