MONDAY, May 10 (HealthDay News) -- Increasing dietary whole grains, especially the bran component, is linked to decreased all-cause and cardiovascular disease-specific mortality in women with type 2 diabetes, according to a study published online May 10 in Circulation.
Meian He, M.D., of the Harvard School of Public Health in Boston, and colleagues conducted a study of 7,822 women with type 2 diabetes mellitus enrolled in the Nurses' Health Study. Over a follow-up period of up to 26 years, questionnaires were administered to assess dietary intake of whole grains, including the components of cereal fiber, bran and germ.
The researchers found that there were 852 all-cause deaths and 295 cardiovascular disease deaths during the study period. Comparing the highest quintiles of whole grain, cereal fiber, bran and germ intake with the lowest, there was a 16 to 31 percent lower all-cause mortality; however, after adjustment for possible confounding factors, only the relationship between bran intake and mortality remained significant. The relative risk of all-cause mortality for the highest quintile of bran intake was 0.72; the relative risk for cardiovascular disease-specific mortality was 0.65 in the highest quintile, and there was a significant inverse relationship between bran intake and cardiovascular disease-specific mortality.
"In summary, we found that intakes of whole grain, especially its subcomponent bran, were inversely associated with all-cause and cardiovascular disease-specific mortality among women with type 2 diabetes mellitus. Our findings suggest that low whole-grain intake may be considered an important modifiable risk factor for decreasing mortality and cardiovascular risk in diabetic patients," the authors write.
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