{"id":40926,"date":"2014-01-06T17:15:39","date_gmt":"2014-01-06T22:15:39","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.nejm.org\/cardioexchange\/?post_type=news&p=40926"},"modified":"2014-01-06T17:15:39","modified_gmt":"2014-01-06T22:15:39","slug":"mediterranean-diet-protects-against-diabetes-regardless-of-weight-loss","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.nejm.org\/cardioexchange\/2014\/01\/06\/mediterranean-diet-protects-against-diabetes-regardless-of-weight-loss\/","title":{"rendered":"Mediterranean Diet Protects Against Diabetes, Regardless of Weight Loss"},"content":{"rendered":"

Even if it doesn’t lead to weight loss, a Mediterranean diet could help prevent the onset of type 2 diabetes, according to a subanalysis of last year’s influential PREDIMED study. In the main trial, reported in the New England Journal of Medicine<\/em><\/a>, nearly 7500\u00a0people at high risk for cardiovascular disease were randomized to a low-fat diet or a Mediterranean diet supplemented by either extra-virgin olive oil (EVOO) or nuts. After nearly 5 years’ follow-up, the study was stopped early because of a significant reduction in cardiovascular events in the Mediterranean diet groups.<\/p>\n

The new paper, published in the <\/a>Annals of Internal Medicine<\/a>, <\/em>examines the development of\u00a0diabetes\u00a0\u2014 a prespecified secondary outcome\u00a0\u2014 among the 3541 participants who did not have diabetes at baseline and for whom the follow-up diabetes status was available. After 4.1 years’ follow-up, there was\u00a0a significant, 30% reduction in the risk for diabetes in the combined Mediterranean diet groups compared with the low-fat diet group (HR 0.70, \u00a0CI 0.54 – 0.92). Separately, the reduction was significant in the EVOO group but not in the nuts group. New-onset diabetes had occurred in 6.9% of people in the EVOO group, 7.4% in the nuts group, and 8.8% in the control group.<\/p>\n

The differences in outcome appeared to be unrelated to weight loss, as the differences in weight loss across the groups were “negligible.” The authors explain that the major goal of the trial was\u00a0“to change the overall dietary pattern,” and they did not attempt to reduce calories or increase physical activity.<\/p>\n

It should be noted that more patients were lost to follow-up in the control group than in the Mediterranean diet groups (10.5% in the control group versus 6.9% in the nuts group and 4.1% in the EVOO group). The authors warn that any conclusions must be considered exploratory given that this was a substudy based on a subgroup of a larger trial.<\/p>\n

Nevertheless, they conclude that PREDIMED “provides strong evidence that long-term adherence to a Mediterranean diet supplemented with EVOO without energy restrictions, which is high in monounsaturated fat and bioactive polyphenols, results in a substantial reduction in the risk for type 2 diabetes among older persons with high cardiovascular risk. Of note, this dietary pattern is palatable and has a high potential for long-term sustainability, with obvious public health implications for primary prevention of diabetes.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Even if it doesn’t lead to weight loss, a Mediterranean diet could help prevent the onset of type 2 diabetes, according to a subanalysis of last year’s influential PREDIMED study. In the main trial, reported in the New England Journal of Medicine, nearly 7500\u00a0people at high risk for cardiovascular disease were randomized to a low-fat […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":196,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1,7],"tags":[200,1695,469],"class_list":["post-40926","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general","category-prevention","tag-diabetes","tag-mediterranean-diet","tag-type-2-diabetes"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.nejm.org\/cardioexchange\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40926","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.nejm.org\/cardioexchange\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.nejm.org\/cardioexchange\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.nejm.org\/cardioexchange\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/196"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.nejm.org\/cardioexchange\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=40926"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.nejm.org\/cardioexchange\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40926\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.nejm.org\/cardioexchange\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=40926"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.nejm.org\/cardioexchange\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=40926"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.nejm.org\/cardioexchange\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=40926"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}