Association between dietary inflammatory index and urinary flow rate: a nationwide study, NHANES 2009-2016

Some evidence have suggested that various nutrients and inflammatory factors might influence the lower urinary tract function. However, the correlation between diet and urinary flow rate (UFR) is not clear. Our study aimed to evaluate the association between the dietary inflammatory index (DII) and UFR. We performed a cross-sectional analysis using data from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) database from 2009-2016. The dependent and independent variables were UFR and DII score, respectively. Dietary information was collected by 24-hour dietary recall interviews method, and DII scores were computed based on it. Tertiles group was divided according to DII scores. The study included 17,114 participants for whom data on DII and UFR were available, with a mean age of 35.68 ± 20.96 years. Participants with higher DII score presented lower UFR levels (β= -0.05; 95% CI: [-0.06-0.04]). In addition, the risk of UFR decline elevated significantly gradual across DII score tertiles (p for trend <0.001). Our findings revealed that increased intake of pro-inflammatory diet, as a higher DII score, is correlated with decreased UFR. These results might be useful for the public health system to provide primary prevention recommendations for lower urinary tract voiding problem, but further high-quality prospective research is needed.