• Oliver M Shannon, Janice M Ranson, Sarah Gregory, Helen Macpherson, Catherine Milte, Marleen Lentjes, Angela Mulligan, Claire McEvoy, Alex Griffiths, Jamie Matu, Tom R Hill, Ashley Adamson, Mario Siervo, Anne Marie Minihane, Graciela Muniz-Tererra, Craig Ritchie, John C Mathers, David J Llewellyn, and Emma Stevenson.
• Human Nutrition & Exercise Research Centre, Centre for Healthier Lives, Population Health Sciences Institute, Newcastle University, Newcastle Upon Tyne, UK.
• Bmc Med. 2023 Mar 14; 21 (1): 8181.

BackgroundThe identification of effective dementia prevention strategies is a major public health priority, due to the enormous and growing societal cost of this condition. Consumption of a Mediterranean diet (MedDiet) has been proposed to reduce dementia risk. However, current evidence is inconclusive and is typically derived from small cohorts with limited dementia cases. Additionally, few studies have explored the interaction between diet and genetic risk of dementia.MethodsWe used Cox proportional hazard regression models to explore the associations between MedDiet adherence, defined using two different scores (Mediterranean Diet Adherence Screener [MEDAS] continuous and Mediterranean diet Pyramid [PYRAMID] scores), and incident all-cause dementia risk in 60,298 participants from UK Biobank, followed for an average 9.1 years. The interaction between diet and polygenic risk for dementia was also tested.ResultsHigher MedDiet adherence was associated with lower dementia risk (MEDAS continuous: HR = 0.77, 95% CI = 0.65-0.91; PYRAMID: HR = 0.86, 95% CI = 0.73-1.02 for highest versus lowest tertiles). There was no significant interaction between MedDiet adherence defined by the MEDAS continuous and PYRAMID scores and polygenic risk for dementia.ConclusionsHigher adherence to a MedDiet was associated with lower dementia risk, independent of genetic risk, underlining the importance of diet in dementia prevention interventions.© 2023. The Author(s).

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