Healthy Diet May Prevent Age-Related
Disability
March 4, 2005
Researchers may have come up with another reason to
eat well. A new study suggests diets rich in fruits,
vegetables and dairy foods can prevent the disabilities
that often come with age.
The study, which followed 9,404 middle-aged Americans
for nine years, found that a healthy diet seemed particularly
beneficial among African-American women, who are generally
at greater risk than white women of developing physical
limitations as they age.
Researchers found that African American women who ate
the most fruits and vegetables on a daily basis were
about one-third to one-half less likely than those with
the lowest intakes to develop problems with activities
such as walking, climbing stairs and doing household
chores. High intakes of dairy products such as milk,
cheese and yogurt showed an even stronger protective
effect.
Similar benefits were found among white women -- at
least when it came to fruit and vegetable intake --
though the protective effect was not as great.
The findings are published in the American Journal
of Clinical Nutrition.
Diet is well known to be a factor in a host of diseases,
including heart disease, diabetes, some cancers and
the bone-thinning disease osteoporosis. But less is
known about the role of diet in age-related disability,
according to the authors of the new study.
"Getting the recommended number of servings of
dairy, fruits and vegetables should be investigated
for its potential to reduce the prevalence of disability
in the aging population," lead author Dr. Denise
Houston said in a statement.
"We know that obesity, lack of physical exercise,
alcohol consumption and smoking are modifiable factors
for disability, but little is known about the role of
diet," added Houston, a research associate at Wake
Forest University Baptist Medical Center in Winston-Salem,
North Carolina.
Experts recommend that adults eat two to three servings
of low-fat dairy and five to nine servings of fruits
and vegetables each day.
The study included 9,404 African-American and white
men and women between the ages of 45 and 64 at the outset.
At study entry, they completed diet questionnaires that
asked how often they ate various foods.
After roughly nine years, 67 percent of the African
American women had developed problems with walking,
climbing steps, kneeling or other types of lower-limb
movement. White men were the least likely to have such
problems, with 37 percent reporting lower-limb limitations.
African American women also had the highest rates of
other types of disabilities, such as difficulty with
household chores or basic needs like getting around
the house or out of bed.
However, African American women with the highest level
of fruits, vegetables and dairy products in their diets
were much less likely than their peers to develop any
disability.
According to Houston's team, a healthy diet may ward
off physical limitations in a number of ways. The calcium
and vitamin D in dairy foods may prevent problems associated
with osteoporosis and declines in muscle strength.
Fruits and vegetables are rich in antioxidants, nutrients
that counter the potentially cell-damaging effects of
oxygen free radicals -- substances that are normal byproducts
of metabolism and that, over time, can lead to cumulative
damage in body tissue.
Fruits and vegetables are rich in antioxidants, nutrients
that counter the potentially cell-damaging effects of
oxygen free radicals -- substances that are normal byproducts
of metabolism and that, over time, can lead to cumulative
damage in body tissue.
Exactly why a healthy diet was more protective in African
American women than in white women is unclear. The finding,
Houston and her colleagues note, could reflect differences
in the types of produce or dairy products that African
American and white women eat. For example, African Americans
have been shown eat more dark green vegetables and get
more vitamin A and C than white Americans do.
Source:www.reuters.com
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