Are Dietary Patterns Relevant for Reducing the Risk of Fractures and Sarcopenia?

This review aims to summarise recent evidence on the effects of dietary patterns on the risk of bone fractures and sarcopenia.

Several dietary patterns have been investigated in relation to musculoskeletal health, including Mediterranean Dietary Patterns (MDP), Dietary Inflammatory Indices, vegetarian and vegan diets. Adherence to 'healthier' dietary patterns appears to be protective against fractures and sarcopenia, with the strongest protective associations found between the MDP and fractures. Individuals following vegan or vegetarian eating patterns need to be aware of calcium and vitamin D requirements to maintain musculoskeletal health. Although more healthy dietary patterns may be protective for musculoskeletal health the current evidence base is limited by variation in the construction of dietary pattern scores and reported outcome measures. Future research should fully report scoring methods, intakes of dietary components across scoring groups or categories, and consider outcome measures that allow for better comparison between studies.