Fruit, vegatable and vitamin benefit

[Guest guest]

Hi All,

The below paper appeared to me to be significant in

implying good things follow from our healthy diet.

However, examining the pdf, which is available,

certainly to me suggested there are difficulties in

making such a direct conclusion.

The Medline abstract does suggest that total, heart

disease and cancer benefits are equally improved.

But, as might be expected, those who follow the

healthy diet life have many other relevant properties.

The increases in quintiles of intakes of goodies was

correlated with vitamin supplement use, eating better

fats, being more married and educated and less smoking,

having had major disease as a motivation for being

health-conscious, having lower cholesterol and

consuming less fat, cholesterol, saturated fat and

alcohol.

Then, when it came to the numbers for the vitamins

associated with all-cause mortality, the confidence

intervals were less than 1 for many of them. It was only

that the trend was 1 for lowest to lower for intermediate

and then approaching 1 for higher quintiles of mortality.

The same features were seen for the deaths from

heart disease and cancer for the confidence intervals

and corresponding odds ratios.

Therefore, we may require less vitamins than the

dose we inflict ourselves with from our supplements?

The vitamins are beneficial in a hormetic pattern?

Am J Epidemiol. 2004 Dec 15;160(12):1223-33.

Fruit, Vegetable, and Antioxidant Intake and All-Cause, Cancer, and

Cardiovascular Disease Mortality in a Community-dwelling Population in

Washington County, land.

Genkinger JM, Platz EA, Hoffman SC, Comstock GW, Helzlsouer KJ.

... This ... prospective study ... 1974 and 1989

and completed a food frequency questionnaire in 1989 (N = 6,151)

.... Participants were followed to date of death or

January 1, 2002. Compared with those in the bottom fifth,

participants in the

highest fifth of fruit and vegetable intake had a lower risk of all-

cause (cases

= 910; hazard ratio (HR) = 0.63, 95% confidence interval (CI): 0.51,

0.78;

p-trend = 0.0004), cancer (cases = 307; HR = 0.65, 95% CI: 0.45,

0.93; p-trend =

0.08), and cardiovascular disease (cases = 225; HR = 0.76, 95% CI:

0.54, 1.06;

p-trend = 0.15) mortality. Higher intake of cruciferous vegetables was

associated with lower risk of all-cause mortality (HR = 0.74, 95% CI:

0.60,

0.91; p-trend = 0.04). No statistically significant associations were

observed

between dietary vitamin C, vitamin E, and beta-carotene intake and

mortality.

Overall, greater intake of fruits and vegetables was associated with

lower risk

of all-cause, cancer, and cardiovascular disease death. These

findings support

the general health recommendation to consume multiple servings of

fruits and

vegetables (5-9/day).

PMID: 15583375 [PubMed - in process]

Cheers, Alan Pater