Association Between Ideal Cardiovascular Health and Vegetarian Dietary Patterns Among Community-Dwelling Individuals

Yu-Min He; Wei-Liang Chen; Tung-Wei Kao; Li-Wei Wu; Hui-Fang Yang; Tao-Chun Peng

doi:10.3389/fnut.2022.761982

Association Between Ideal Cardiovascular Health and Vegetarian Dietary Patterns Among Community-Dwelling Individuals

Front Nutr. 2022 Mar 18:9:761982. doi: 10.3389/fnut.2022.761982. eCollection 2022.

Authors

Yu-Min He¹, Wei-Liang Chen^{1

2

3}, Tung-Wei Kao^{1

2

4}, Li-Wei Wu^{1

2

3}, Hui-Fang Yang^{1

2}, Tao-Chun Peng^{1

2}

Affiliations

¹ Division of Family Medicine, Department of Family and Community Medicine, National Defense Medical Center, Tri-Service General Hospital, Taipei, Taiwan.
² Division of Geriatric Medicine, Department of Family and Community Medicine, National Defense Medical Center, Tri-Service General Hospital, Taipei, Taiwan.
³ Graduate Institute of Medical Sciences, National Defense Medical Center, Taipei, Taiwan.
⁴ Graduate Institute of Clinical Medicine, College of Medicine, National Taiwan University, Taipei, Taiwan.

Abstract

Background: Vegetarians have been shown to have better metabolic profiles than non-vegetarians, and vegetarianism has potential beneficial effects on cardiovascular disease. However, there is a lack of studies on vegetarians that examine both metabolic profiles and lifestyle habits, such as physical activity, smoking habits, and dietary patterns, which are equally important in the context of cardiovascular disease. We explored whether a vegetarian diet is associated with both metabolic traits and lifestyle habits by assessing cardiovascular health (CVH) metrics.

Methods: This was a cross-sectional study conducted in a Taiwanese population. Data collected between 2000 and 2016 were extracted from the MJ Health database. Participants aged 40 years and older without cardiovascular disease were included. CVH metrics included smoking habits, blood pressure, total cholesterol, serum glucose, body mass index, physical activity, and healthy diet score. Vegetarian participants were full-time vegetarians who did not consume meat or fish. All the data were assessed from self-report questionnaires, physical examinations, and blood analyses following standard protocol. Multiple logistic regression analysis was used to evaluate the association between vegetarianism and CVH metrics.

Results: Of 46,287 eligible participants, 1,896 (4.1%) were vegetarian. Overall, vegetarians had better CVH metrics (OR = 2.09, 95% CI = 1.84-2.37) but lower healthy diet scores (OR = 0.41, 95% CI = 0.33-0.51) after adjustment. No difference in physical activity (OR = 0.86, 95% CI = 0.73-1.02) was identified between vegetarians and non-vegetarians. Additionally, vegetarians had higher whole grain intake (OR = 2.76, 95% CI = 2.28-3.35) and lower sugar-sweetened beverage consumption (OR = 1.36, 95% CI = 1.18-1.58).

Conclusions: Our results suggested that vegetarians had better overall ideal CVH metrics but lower ideal healthy diet scores than non-vegetarians, which was likely due to the lack of fish consumption in this population group. When assessing CVH metrics and healthy diet scores for vegetarians, metrics and scores chosen should be suitable for use with vegetarian populations.

Keywords: American Heart Association (AHA); Life's Simple 7 (LS7); cardiovascular disease; cardiovascular health (CVH); risk factor; vegetarian.