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Posted on 07/28/2025 10:21:57 PM PDT by nickcarraway
Poor diets at age 56 associated with higher risks 10 years later
Key Takeaways
-Diets high in ultraprocessed foods were tied to prodromal Parkinson's disease, incident Parkinson's, and Parkinson's-specific mortality. -The study followed 120,000 U.K. Biobank participants for a median of 10.5 years.
-Ultraprocessed food intake has been tied to dementia, but data about Parkinson's disease were sparse until recently.
A diet high in ultraprocessed foods was tied to a higher risk of Parkinson's disease, prospective data from the U.K. Biobank suggested.
Over a median follow-up of 10.5 years, the highest quartile of ultraprocessed food consumption was associated with three or more prodromal Parkinson's features (HR 1.65, 95% CI 1.35-2.02), incident Parkinson's disease (HR 1.32, 95% CI 1.02-1.71), and Parkinson's-related mortality (HR 3.11, 95% CI 1.56-6.17) compared with the lowest quartile, according to Fang Fang Zhang, MD, PhD, of Tufts University in Boston, and co-authors.
"These findings may prompt further research to understand the mechanisms behind ultraprocessed foods and Parkinson's disease and influence dietary guidelines and public health policies" to prevent prodromal and incident Parkinson's disease and Parkinson's-specific mortality, Zhang and colleagues wrote in the Journal of Neurology, Neurosurgery & Psychiatryopens in a new tab or window.
Ultraprocessed foods and their components have been tied to dementiaopens in a new tab or window, obesity, and cardiovascular risk factorsopens in a new tab or window, but data about Parkinson's disease were sparse until recently. Earlier this year, Zhang and other researchers reported that a high consumption of ultraprocessed foods was linked with an uptick in nonmotor prodromal Parkinson's symptomsopens in a new tab or window in a study of nearly 43,000 U.S. health professionals.
In the current analysis, Zhang and co-authors studied 119,794 U.K. Biobankopens in a new tab or window participants who had a mean baseline age of 56 years; 90.2% were white British. Participants were free of dementia, cancer, or Parkinson's disease at baseline. Each participant completed at least two 24-hour dietary assessments.
The researchers defined ultraprocessed foods according to NOVA categoriesopens in a new tab or window, classifying them into four groups: unprocessed or minimally processed foods (fresh fruits, vegetables, legumes, milk, and meat, for example), processed culinary ingredients (such as table salt and sugar), processed foods (canned or bottled vegetables and legumes in brine), and ultraprocessed foods (industrially processed beverages, sauces, and snacks; flavored yogurts; industrially processed breads and buns; and processed meats).
Prodromal Parkinson's features were determined through ICD codes, primary care data, and self-reported health conditions and included depression, rapid eye movement behavior disorder, urinary incontinence, constipation, anxiety, orthostatic hypotension, hyposmia, and erectile dysfunction. Incident Parkinson's disease was assessed through ICD codes, and mortality data were obtained from death certificates.
Ultraprocessed food consumption ranged from a median of 8.38 servings/day in the highest quartile to 2.83 servings/day in the lowest quartile. Participants with higher ultraprocessed food intake were more likely to be men, younger, and have obesity, hypertension, diabetes, or high cholesterol than those with lower ultraprocessed food consumption.
During a median of 10.5 years of follow-up, 1,047 participants had three or more prodromal Parkinson's features, 640 people developed Parkinson's disease, and 114 participants died from Parkinson's.
Throughout the study, ultraprocessed food consumption was consistently linked with Parkinson's disease. "Specifically, we found that each additional serving of commonly consumed ultraprocessed food was associated with a 19% higher risk of prodromal Parkinson's disease, a 4% higher risk of developing Parkinson's disease and a 10% higher risk of Parkinson's disease-specific mortality," Zhang and co-authors wrote.
The findings suggest that ultraprocessed food consumption "was likely important in the course of Parkinson's disease," they added. "The mechanisms underlying these associations remained to be fully elucidated, and vascular diseases could play a mediating or confounding role. ... Although we adjusted for hypertension, dyslipidemia, and diabetes, residual confounding due to subclinical vascular burden cannot be fully excluded."
Dietary intake was self-reported and subject to errors, the researchers acknowledged. Though people with dementia at baseline were excluded, some participants may have had cognitive problems.
A combination of primary care records, hospital admissions, and self-disclosed data helped identify prodromal Parkinson's; however, olfactory tests and movement assessment data were not reported in the U.K. Biobank study. Unknown confounding also may have influenced results.
Judy George covers neurology and neuroscience news for MedPage Today, writing about brain aging, Alzheimer’s, dementia, MS, rare diseases, epilepsy, autism, headache, stroke, Parkinson’s, ALS, concussion, CTE, sleep, pain, and more. Follow
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Thanks.
My problem is that “ultraprocessed” is one of those scare words like “Global Warming.” You have to read the fine print to see if there is anything really there. Will need to study this one.
Ditto, there is no definition of “ultraprocessed” or “processed”. Amazing that an educated researcher would waste time on this. What is “processed” bread? It was processed in an oven, aka “baked”.
99.9% of everything we eat is processed. Literally. Their terminology obscures their propositions. Impossible to decipher.
“My problem is that “ultraprocessed” is one of those scare words like “Global Warming.” You have to read the fine print to see if there is anything really there. Will need to study this one.”
Here are some examples NON-processed food:
Butter: Pasteurized Cream, Salt
Eggs: Eggs
McDonald’s Hamburger Patty: Beef, Salt, Pepper
As to Ultraprocessed: Anything on the inside aisles of a supermarket.
My tap water is processed.
Sounds like a commercial for “organic”.
What a scam that label is.
Talk about not having a clear definition nor standard.
Just put organic on a label and gouge the price up.
Or “grass fed” beef whatever that is.
As someone on YT said, any cow which has ever been in a pasture could be grass fed.
Back over fifty years ago I remember some folk selling cheap steaks out of an unlabeled truck.
I asked my father what the deal was.
He speculated that it was probably Mexican beef without USDA inspection and the beef was probably “grass fed” and tougher than hell.
I don’t know if there is processed bread, but there may be “chemical bread.” I don’t eat the stuff myself, but I have friends who visit who make sandwiches with it. One time they were on a Christmas trip to visit family and stopped both ways. I bought a loaf of standard grocery store bread to have on hand. They made 2 sandwiches, left the loaf on the kitchen counter. I didn’t notice it for a few days, saw no mold, put it in the refrigerator.
On their way back, same thing. 2 sandwiches, loaf on the counter. I decided to experiment and left the loaf out for a week. No mold. Put it in the fridge and waited 6 months. Took it out, no mold and looked and tasted fine. But it had a distinct chemical smell, not a bread smell. I call grocery store bread “chemical bread” now. Not scientific, of course. YMMV
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