Frontiers
Eating a Mediterranean diet can slow down cognitive decline.
The
Mediterranean diet can improve your mind, as well your heart, shows a study
published in the open-access journal Frontiers in Nutrition.
By
sticking to the Mediterranean diet the study showed that people had slowed
rates of cognitive decline, reduced conversion to Alzheimer's, and improved
cognitive function.
The
main foods in the Mediterranean diet (MedDiet) include plant foods, such as
leafy greens, fresh fruit and vegetables, cereals, beans, seeds, nuts, and
legumes. The MedDiet is also low in dairy, has minimal red meat, and uses olive
oil as its major source of fat.
Leading author Roy Hardman from the Centre for Human Psychopharmacology Swinburne University of Technology Melbourne Australia and his colleagues evaluated all the available papers between 2000-2015 that investigated if and how a MedDiet may impact cognitive processes over time. In total, 18 out of the 135 articles met their strict inclusion criteria.
"The
most surprising result was that the positive effects were found in countries
around the whole world. So regardless of being located outside of what is
considered the Mediterranean region, the positive cognitive effects of a higher
adherence to a MedDiet were similar in all evaluated papers;" he said.
Attention,
memory, and language improved. Memory, in particular, was positively affected
by the MedDiet including improvements in: delayed recognition, long-term, and
working memory, executive function, and visual constructs.
"Why
is a higher adherence to the MedDiet related to slowing down the rate of
cognitive decline? The MedDiet offers the opportunity to change some of the
modifiable risk factors," he explained.
"These
include reducing inflammatory responses, increasing micronutrients, improving
vitamin and mineral imbalances, changing lipid profiles by using olive oils as
the main source of dietary fats, maintaining weight and potentially reducing
obesity, improving polyphenols in the blood, improving cellular energy
metabolism and maybe changing the gut micro-biota, although this has not been
examined to a larger extent yet."
Moreover,
the benefits to cognition afforded by the MedDiet were not exclusive to older
individuals. Two of the included studies focused on younger adults and they
both found improvements in cognition using computerized assessments.
The
researchers stress that research in this area is important due to the expected
extensive population aging over the next 20-30 years. They envision that the
utilization of a dietary pattern, such as the MedDiet, will be an essential
tool to maintain quality of life and reduce the potential social and economic
burdens of manifested cognitive declines like dementia.
"I
would therefore recommend people to try to adhere or switch to a MedDiet, even
at an older age," Hardman added.
Like
many researchers, Hardman takes his research home: "I follow the diet
patterns and do not eat any red meats, chicken or pork. I have fish two-three
times per week and adhere to a Mediterranean style of eating."
