A Mediterranean dietWashington, Oct 10: A Mediterranean diet, which includes fruits, vegetables olive oil and little red meat, is can lower the risk of Alzheimer's disease, an article that will appear in the December 2006 print issue of Archives of Neurology stated.
The Mediterranean diet consists of high amounts of fruits, vegetables, legumes, cereals and fish, mild to moderate amounts of alcohol and low amounts of red meat and dairy products.
After conducting the study, it was found that eating a diet that closely followed the Mediterranean model was associated with a significantly lower risk for Alzheimer's disease. For each additional unit on the diet score, risk for Alzheimer's disease decreased by 19 to 24 percent.
The authors said that the growing evidence has linked the Mediterranean diet to a reduced risk for vascular disease and suggests that vascular risk factors may contribute to the risk for Alzheimer's disease.
"Vascular variables are likely to be in the causal pathway between the Mediterranean diet and Alzheimer's disease and should be considered as possible mediators," authors wrote in the article."
"However, when we considered vascular risk factors in our models, the association between the Mediterranean diet and Alzheimer's disease did not change. This was the case despite our attempt to capture vascular comorbidity in the most complete possible way by simultaneously considering both a long list and alternative definitions of vascular variables," they added.
They concluded by saying that this could be the result of either other biological mechanisms or measurement error of the vascular variables. (ANI)