MIND and Mediterranean Diets Associated with Later Onset of Parkinson's Disease

Abstract

Background: The MIND diet has been linked with prevention of Alzheimer's disease and cognitive decline but has not been fully assessed in the context of Parkinson's disease (PD). The objective of the present study was to determine whether MIND diet adherence is associated with the age of Parkinson's disease onset in a manner superior to that of the Mediterranean diet.

Methods: Food Frequency Questionnaires from 167 participants with PD and 119 controls were scored for MIND and 2 versions of Mediterranean diet adherence. Scores were compared between sex and disease subgroups, and PD diet adherence was correlated with age at onset using univariate and multivariate linear models.

Results: The female subgroup adhered more closely to the MIND diet than the male subgroup, and diet scores were not modified by disease status. Later age of onset correlated most strongly with MIND diet adherence in the female subgroup, corresponding to differences of up to 17.4 years (P < 0.001) between low and high dietary tertiles. Greek Mediterranean adherence was also significantly associated with later PD onset across all models (P = 0.05-0.03). Conversely, only Greek Mediterranean diet adherence remained correlated with later onset across all models in men, with differences of up to 8.4 years (P = 0.002).

Conclusions: This cross-sectional study found a strong correlation between age of onset of PD and dietary habits, suggesting that nutritional strategies may be an effective tool to delay PD onset. Further studies may help to elucidate potential nutrition-related sex-specific pathophysiological mechanisms and differential prevalence rates in PD. © 2021 The Authors. Movement Disorders published by Wiley Periodicals LLC on behalf of International Parkinson and Movement Disorder Society.

Keywords: MIND diet; Parkinson's disease; mediterranean diet; sex differences.

FIG. 1

Sex‐stratified scores for (A) MIND diet, (B) OMeDi, and (C) GMeDi. ***P < 0.001. Both PD and control participants are included.

FIG. 2

Estimated change in age of PD onset per unit increase in (A) tertile and (B) continuous (/10) diet scores (β). Multivariate regression was used to calculate all estimates and 95% confidence intervals (represented by lines). *P < 0.05, **P < 0.01, ***P < 0.001.