Eat more fruits and vegetables containing VC/VE, which may prevent Parkinson's disease!

Recently, a research team led by Essi Hantikainen, University of Milan, Italy, and Ylva Trolle Lagerros, Karolinska Institutet, Sweden, published an exciting research result in the famous neurology journal Neurology.

They studied the 17.
6-year follow-up data of 43,865 subjects aged 18-94 in Sweden, and found that dietary vitamin E (VE) and vitamin C (VC) intake may be related to the risk of Parkinson’s disease.
It is inversely proportional, specifically, the risk is reduced by 32%; there is no relationship between dietary β-carotene or dietary non-enzymatic antioxidant capacity (NEAC) and the risk of Parkinson's disease [1].

After reading the results of this research, oranges, strawberries, almonds, and peanuts have to be eaten quickly.

▲ Screenshot of this research paper Parkinson's disease has become the second largest neurodegenerative disease after Alzheimer's disease [2], and its main feature is dopamine deficiency, which leads to a series of motor symptoms [3].

Unfortunately, the pathogenesis of Parkinson's disease is still not fully understood.

However, some research results indicate that oxidative stress may play a central role in the pathogenesis of Parkinson's disease leading to the loss of dopaminergic cells [4, 5].

Since the antioxidants in the diet can scavenge active oxygen, they may play a role in protecting neurons from damage to a certain extent [6].

There is already some evidence that vitamin E intake may reduce the risk of Parkinson's disease, but the research results of vitamin C and β-carotene are still inconsistent [7-9].

In addition, considering that there are interactions between antioxidants in the diet, it is necessary to consider the synergy between various antioxidants, so the non-enzymatic antioxidant capacity (NEAC), which can reflect the antioxidant potential of the diet, is also called Total antioxidant capacity (TAC) is an indicator worth considering [10].

However, so far, only one study has investigated the impact of dietary NEAC on the risk of Parkinson's disease, but the final result is not relevant [11].

In order to further study the impact of dietary antioxidants on the risk of Parkinson's disease, the Hantikainen team hopes to use a prospective Swedish cohort to study the relationship between dietary vitamin E, C, β-carotene, NEAC and Parkinson's disease risk.

▲ From Pixabay, Hantikainen and his colleagues used the famous Swedish National March Cohort queue.

This cohort conducted a follow-up survey of 43,865 Swedish men and women aged 18-94 between 1997 and 2016.

None of these people had Parkinson's disease when they were enrolled.

During the 17.
6-year follow-up period, 465 people were diagnosed with Parkinson's disease, and the average age of the diagnosis of Parkinson's disease was 74.
6 years.

Based on the results of the questionnaire, the researchers divided the subjects into three groups according to different dietary antioxidants: the lowest intake (Q1), the medium intake (Q2) and the highest intake (Q3).

▲ Effects of different levels of dietary antioxidants After adjusting for potential confounding factors, subjects in the highest quantile of dietary vitamin E reduced the risk of Parkinson's disease by 32% compared with subjects in the lowest quantile of dietary vitamin E.

Similar to vitamin E, subjects in the highest quantile of dietary vitamin C had a 32% lower risk of Parkinson's disease compared with subjects in the lowest quantile of dietary vitamin C.

Based on these findings, they also compared the subjects whose intakes of vitamin E and C were both in the highest quantile with those whose intakes of both vitamins were both in the lowest quantile, and found that the highest quantile was affected.
Compared with subjects in the lowest quantile, the participants had a 38% lower risk of Parkinson's disease.

Unfortunately, no correlation was found between dietary β-carotene (p value: 0.
85) or NEAC (p value: 0.
16) and the risk of Parkinson's disease. ▲ The effect of dietary VC/VE in the subgroup analysis, they also found that dietary vitamin E is more effective in overweight and obese subjects, reducing the risk of illness by 56%.

The protective effect of dietary vitamin C was stronger in subjects with low coffee intake (46% reduction) and subjects with overweight or obesity (48% reduction).

As for the reasons behind, the researchers said that studies have shown that obesity is an independent risk factor for Parkinson's disease [12, 13].

This is mainly because obesity is related to increased levels of oxidative stress, which in turn is related to low serum antioxidant levels.

In addition, in obese patients, vitamin levels are sometimes deficient, especially fat-soluble vitamins, folic acid, vitamin B12 and vitamin C [14].

▲ The influence of other factors Generally speaking, this large cohort study of the Swedish population shows that higher dietary intake of vitamin E and vitamin C is associated with a lower risk of Parkinson's disease.

And when the intake of both vitamins is higher, the association may be stronger.

In addition, the relationship between dietary vitamin E and vitamin C intake and Parkinson's disease may be altered by BMI and coffee intake.

However, dietary β-carotene or dietary non-enzymatic antioxidant capacity (NEAC) is not associated with the risk of Parkinson's disease.

This study once again proved the previous results, that is, the inverse correlation between antioxidants and Parkinson's disease risk is indeed limited to specific antioxidants, such as vitamin E and vitamin C.

It seems that it is time for us to consider getting more vitamin E and vitamin C from food.

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Author of this article| BioTalker delicious fruitsInternational journal of endocrinology, 2014, 2014.
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Thomas-Valdés S, Tostes MGV, Anunciação PC, et al.
Association between vitamin deficiency and metabolic disorders related to obesity[J].
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The author of this article | BioTalker, delicious fruitInternational journal of endocrinology, 2014, 2014.
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Thomas-Valdés S, Tostes MGV, Anunciação PC, et al.
Association between vitamin deficiency and metabolic disorders related to obesity[J].
Critical reviews in food science and nutrition, 2017 , 57(15): 3332-3343.
The author of this article | BioTalker, delicious fruit