- Full Text
- Trade Journal
Can Quality of Diet Lower the Risk of Depressive Symptoms?
Full text preview
Dr. Feldman reports no financial relationships relevant to this field of study.
SUMMARY POINTS
* The authors of this meta-analysis incorporated 42 observational studies (20 longitudinal) investigating the degree of compliance to a predefined healthy diet and the emergence of depressive symptoms or depressive disorder.* Most dietary guidelines used in the study followed the Mediterranean diet, the Healthy Eating Index, the Alternative Healthy Index, the Dietary Approach to Stop Hypertension, and the Dietary Inflammatory Index.* The most robust evidence was found in subjects with high adherence to the Mediterranean diet. They had a 33% reduced risk of depression when compared with low adherence to the diet.* Comparing the least inflammatory to the most inflammatory diet revealed a 24% reduction in depressive outcomes among participants in five longitudinal studies. A limiting factor was significant heterogeneity among these studies.
SOURCE: Lassale C, Batty GD, Baghdadli A, et al. Healthy dietary indices and risk of depressive outcomes: A systematic review and meta-analysis of observational studies. Mol Psychiatry 2018; Nov 21. doi: 10.1038/s41380-018-0299-7. [Epub ahead of print].
Lassale et al noted mixed results from the literature regarding diet and depressive symptoms. Citing several factors, such as variable methodology both when defining diet and measuring depressive symptoms that could be contributing to these mixed results, they conducted this meta-analysis to pool and analyze results from studies using specified dietary indices and a standardized approach to measuring depressive symptoms.
More than 300 million people worldwide live with depression. The prevalence varies worldwide and generally is higher in more developed countries. Debilitation from untreated or unresponsive depressive disorders contribute to an estimated productivity loss to the global economy of $1 trillion per year. 1,2 In 2016, an estimated 16.2 million U.S. adults had at least one depressive episode, and the prevalence among adult women and men was 8.5%...