Mediterranean diet associated with gut microbiome improvements
20 February, 2020
New research has discovered that older people who honored a Mediterranean diet for a year had healthier gut microbiomes and improved measures of frailty.
Mediterranean-type diets - abundant with vegetables, legumes, nuts, and wholegrains and typically excluding red meat - have been the subject of numerous studies about health insurance and nutrition.
Existing research has found that many persons who follow a Mediterranean diet may have better heart and metabolic health, live longer, and could have even better mental health.
A fresh study conducted by experts from institutions in eight countries - like the University of Bologna, in Italy, and University College Cork, in Ireland - is now adding to the set of potential benefits brought on by a Mediterranean diet.
The researchers - who report their findings in the journal Gut - worked with data from a cohort of more than 600 older adults in five countries. They discovered that, over the spectrum, a Mediterranean diet appeared to improve aging individuals’ gut health insurance and reduce frailty.
The first author of the analysis paper is Tarini Shankar Ghosh, Ph.D., from the APC Microbiome Ireland research institute.
Wanting to reduce frailty
The study’s authors point out that previous research has suggested that a simple dietary intervention such as switching to a Mediterranean-style diet might reduce frailty in the elderly.
That is important because frailty involves the gradual breakdown of multiple systems simultaneously, often involving widespread, low-grade inflammation that further plays a part in poor health.
To verify that switching to a Mediterranean diet could lower measures of frailty, the researchers involved in the current study recruited 612 individuals aged 65-79.
Medical exams showed that 28 of the analysis participants qualified as “frail,” 151 were on the verge of frailty, and 433 showed no signs of frailty.
The participants came from France, Italy, the Netherlands, Poland, or the uk.
Of the full total number, 323 individuals (141 men and 182 women) decided to follow a Mediterranean-type diet for 1 year, as the rest continued with their usual diets and acted as a control group.
The Mediterranean diet involved was abundant with vegetables, legumes, fruits, nuts, essential olive oil, and fish. It featured very little red meat and few dairy products or saturated fats.
Better bacterial diversity in the gut
To comprehend the diet’s effects on the health of older individuals, the researchers started by examining the impact on gut health.
That was because previous studies have suggested that older individuals - particularly those that live in residential care facilities - generally have less healthy gut microbiotas, possibly consequently of more restrictive diets.
Subsequently, an unhealthy gut corresponds to poorer general health and faster onset of frailty in older adults.
When the researchers compared the compositions of the gut microbiomes of participants who had followed a Mediterranean diet for a year with those of participants who had followed their usual diets, they found significant differences.
Stool samples revealed that after 12 months on the Mediterranean diet, the participants had better bacterial diversity in the gut, weighed against peers from the control group.
Moreover, better gut bacterial diversity was connected with improved markers of frailty, including better walking speed, better handgrip strength, and improved cognitive functioning.
Participants who had adhered to the Mediterranean diet also displayed fewer markers of chronic low-grade inflammation.
Why Mediterranean diets could be beneficial
Looking more closely at that which was happening in the participants’ guts, the researchers discovered that health improvements were associated with richer populations of bacteria that produce beneficial short-chain fatty acids, on the one hand, and decreased populations of bacteria that produce bile acids, on the other.
The researchers explain that whenever bacteria release an excessive amount of certain bile acids, it really is associated with an increased threat of insulin resistance, fat buildup in the liver, cell damage, and even bowel cancer.
In line with the researchers, the positive changes were likely because of the Mediterranean diet having provided a regular way to obtain key nutrients, including fiber and crucial minerals and vitamins, such as for example vitamins C, B-6, and B-9, and copper, potassium, iron, manganese, and magnesium.
When they adjusted their findings for potential confounding factors, such as for example age and body mass index, the investigators observed that the associations between the Mediterranean diet and better gut health remained in place.
The team also noted subtle dissimilarities in participants’ microbiome changes, depending on the countries that they lived in, which speaks to the independent influences of other environmental factors.
No matter these variations, all the persons who followed the Mediterranean diet showed the same overall improvements in gut and systemic health, the researchers emphasize.
Although they caution that their research was observational, and so cannot point to a direct causal relationship, the investigators write that:
“By protecting the ‘core’ of the gut microbial community, adherence to the [Mediterranean] diet could facilitate the retention of a stable community state in the microbiome, providing resilience and protecting from changes to alternative states that are found in unhealthy [individuals].”
While they continue steadily to maintain that the Mediterranean diet is, overall, beneficial, the researchers acknowledge that it could be impractical for a few older persons - an obstacle that healthcare professionals must contend with.
“In some older [people] with problems like dentition, saliva production, dysphagia, or irritable bowel syndrome, adapting a [Mediterranean diet] might not exactly be a realistic option,” the researchers caution within their study paper.
Source: www.medicalnewstoday.com
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