Mediterranean diet helps prevent CVD, microvascular complications in diabetes

Individuals with types 1 (T1D) and 2 diabetes (T2D) mellitus who adhere to a Mediterranean dietary pattern are at lower risk of cardiovascular disease (CVD) and microvascular complications, including diabetic retinopathy and nephropathy, a study has found.

The study included 71,392 adults (69.78 percent women) with T1D (mean age 50.7 years) or T2D (mean age 59.9 years) who attended academic tertiary care outpatient clinics across Iran. Of these, 22,187 patients completed two to 11 follow-up visits after enrolment.

Multivariable logistic regression analysis revealed that adherence to a Mediterranean diet had a protective effect against the incidence of CVD among patients with T1D (odds ratio [OR], 0.53, 95 percent confidence interval [CI], 0.37–0.75; p<0.001) and T2D (OR, 0.61, 95 percent CI, 0.57–0.89; p<0.001).

In addition, the diet was associated with a reduced risk of incident symptomatic neuropathy (T1D: OR, 0.32, 95 percent CI, 0.23–0.43, p<0.001; T2D: OR, 0.68, 95 percent CI, 0.64–0.72, p<0.001), nephropathy (T1D: OR, 0.42, 95 percent CI, 0.30–0.58, p<0.001; T2D: OR, 0.88, 95 percent CI, 0.80–0.96, p=0.007), and retinopathy (T1D: OR, 0.32, 95 percent CI, 0.24–0.44, p<0.001; ,T2D: OR= 0.68, 95 percent CI, 0.61–0.71, p<0.001).

Mediterranean diet had no significant effect on the risk of developing of diabetic foot complications in both T1D and T2D.