The Effect of Dietary Patterns on Reducing Falls and Falls Risk in Adults: A Systematic Review

Falls are a major global public health issue and the second cause of unintentional injury death. Nutrition may be an important factor for falls prevention in adults, but most previous studies examined the associations between single nutrients and falls. The use of dietary patterns is an alternative method to measure whole diet and its relationship with health outcomes. Therefore, we aimed to systematically review all evidence relating to dietary pattern impacts on falls and/or falls risk in adults.

This systematic review was registered on the PROSPERO (CRD42020171987). Four databases (Medline, Embase, Cochrane Library, CINAHL Complete) were used for searching potential articles on 18th December 2021 and updated the search on 10th July 2023. We included any quantitative study reporting associations between dietary patterns and falls and/or falls risk in healthy adults ≥ 18 years and publishing in English as full text and peer-reviewed. Of 2866 potential articles, five studies (two cross-sectional, three cohorts) were included for the evidence synthesis. The risk of bias was low in cohort studies. Dietary patterns were derived using both "a priori" or "empirical" approaches, and self-report questionnaires used for falls/falls risk in most studies. Associations between dietary patterns and falls/falls risk were inconsistent results by sex and study design. The effect of dietary patterns on reducing falls/falls risk is not clear in the included studies, so this association needs to be confirmed in future research.