Fruit, statins and exercise to prevent brain decline

[mikeccolella]

25408208 pubmed

 

Looked impressive to me!

 

by the way why can't I copy and paste onto this forum??????? It never works!

[TomBAvoider]

Mike, I don't know the reasons for your C&P issues, but I'll post your link. FWIW, I'm on Chrome Version 49.0.2623.112 (64-bit), and on a Mac (OS X 10.9.5).

 

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25408208

 

J Alzheimers Dis. 2015;44(4):1121-9. doi: 10.3233/JAD-141929.

 

Lower risk of Alzheimer's disease mortality with exercise, statin, and fruit intake.

 

Williams PT1.

Author information

 

Abstract

 

BACKGROUND:

Whether lifestyle affects Alzheimer's disease (AD) risk remains controversial.

 

OBJECTIVE:

Test whether exercise, diet, or statins affect AD mortality in 153,536 participants of the National Runners' and Walkers' Health Studies.

 

METHODS:

Hazard ratios (HR) and 95% confidence intervals (95% CI) were obtained from Cox proportional hazard analyses for AD mortality versus baseline metabolic equivalent (MET) hours/d of exercise energy expenditure (1 MET equals approximately 1 km run), statin use, and fruit intake when adjusted for age, race, gender, education, and exercise mode.

 

RESULTS:

The National Death Index identified 175 subjects who died with AD listed as an underlying (n = 116) or contributing (n = 59) cause of death during 11.6-year average mortality surveillance. Relative to exercising <1.07 MET-hours/d, AD mortality was 6.0% lower for 1.07 to 1.8 MET-hours/d (HR: 0.94, 95% CI: 0.59 to 1.46, p = 0.79), 24.8% lower for 1.8 to 3.6 MET-hours/d (HR: 0.75, 95% CI: 0.50 to 1.13, p = 0.17), and 40.1% lower for ≥3.6 MET-hours/d (HR: 0.60, 95% CI: 0.37 to 0.97, p = 0.04). Relative to non-use, statin use was associated with 61% lower AD mortality (HR: 0.39, 95% CI: 0.15 to 0.82, p = 0.01), whereas use of other cholesterol-lowering medications was not (HR: 0.78, 95% CI: 0.40 to 1.38, p = 0.42). Relative to <1 piece of fruit/day, consuming 2 to 3 pieces daily was associated with 39.7% lower AD mortality (HR: 0.60, 95% CI: 0.39 to 0.91, p = 0.02) and ≥3 pieces/day with 60.7% lower AD mortality (HR: 0.39, 95% CI: 0.22 to 0.67, p = 0.0004).

 

CONCLUSIONS:

Exercise, statin, and fruit intake were associated with lower risk for AD mortality.

 

KEYWORDS:

Alzheimer's disease; diet; epidemiology; prevention; prospective cohort study; running; statins; walking

PMID: 25408208 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]  

 

Interesting, that the greatest lowering of AD is due to statin use and higher fruit consumption at about the same level - 61% and 60.7% respectively. Now, what I want to know is if it's cumulative, that is, if you exercise intensely, eat a lot of fruit and take statins, whether you'll lower your odds of AD mortality by 40.1% + 60.7% + 61% or whether the effect will be additive, but not fully additive, so, say for 2 of those behaviors you end up with, say, 70%, and with three, say, 75%. Or whether it's not additive at all - there are plenty of interventions, f.ex. for CVD that result in lower levels of disease only in those who either have the disease or are predisposed to it, whereas those who are neither have rates of CVD that are the same before and after intervention. That by the way is a big issue for folks who are already at a "healthy" BMI, don't smoke, exercise, have a "healthy" diet - any further interventions frequently are of no additional benefit to them. I suppose it's even conceivable that combining some of these might result in a net *decline* of the effect, so if, f.ex. you both exercise heavily and take a statin, your net benefit is only, say, 35%, or 55%, instead of the hoped for additive of 61+%.