Association of different diet quality scores with cardiovascular disease mortality risk in hypertension treatment group

This study investigated the association between several dietary quality scores-including the healthy eating index-2015(HEI-2015), dietary inflammatory index (DII), and dietary approaches to stop hypertension (DASH)-and the risk of cardiovascular disease(CVD) mortality in hypertension treatment group.

Data were obtained from 11,310 participants in the the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (1999-2016). Diet quality scores were calculated based on the type and quantity of food and beverages consumed by participants in the past 24 h. CVD mortality was defined as deaths from heart or cerebrovascular disease (ICD-10). We used cox proportional hazards regression to assess the association between diet quality scores and CVD mortality.

During an average follow-up period of 109 months, 1324 deaths from CVD were confirmed. HEI-2015 and DII showed statistically significant negative association (HR, 0.9404 (95% CI = 0.8846, 0.9998), p = 0.0491) and positive correlation (HR, 1.0514 (95% CI = 1.0055, 1.0995), p = 0.0278) with CVD mortality. DASH showed no statistically significant negative correlation with CVD mortality (HR, 0.9639 (95% CI = 0.9215, 1.0083), p = 0.1096). However, trend tests for all three diet quality scores were significant (p < 0.05).

The HEI-2015 and DASH dietary patterns reduce the risk of CVD mortality in the hypertension treatment group. In contrast, the DII dietary pattern increases the risk of CVD mortality in such patients.