Dietary inflammatory index and dietary energy density are associated with menopausal symptoms in postmenopausal women: a cross-sectional study

Comparison of predictive effect of the dietary inflammatory index and empirically derived food-based dietary inflammatory index on the menopause-specific quality of life and its complications

INTRODUCTION

Menopause, defined as the cessation of menstruation for at least 12 months, is one of the important stages of a woman's life cycle. Some hormonal variations occur during the transition to menopause, which affects women's quality of life. Recently, the role of dietary factors in alleviating symptoms has been investigated.

AIM OF THIS STUDY

We tried to investigate the relationship between dietary inflammatory index (DII), food-based dietary inflammatory index (FDII) and quality of life, and menopausal symptoms, comparing their predictive power and suggesting the best cut-off point.

METHODOLOGY

One hundred forty-nine postmenopausal women were included in the cross-sectional study. After collecting data by interview, the desired variables were calculated. Logistic regression and ROC curves were used to investigate the relationship and predictive power of DII and FDII with menopausal symptoms.

FINDINGS

We observed that both DII and FDII were significantly associated with the severity of sexual symptoms. The first tertile of DII (OR = 0.252, P-value = 0.002) and FDII (OR = 0.316, P-value = 0.014) had a significantly lower odds ratio for severe to moderate symptoms compared to the third tertile. Both inflammatory indices had significant predictive power in predicting the probability of having severe to moderate poor quality of life (FDII (p-value = 0.004) > DII (p-value = 0.006)) and sexual symptoms (DII (p-value = 0.002) > FDII (p-value = 0.003)). Also, regarding the physical subtype, only FDII (p-value = 0.002) results were significant.

CONCLUSION

Both dietary inflammatory indices appear to be suitable for predicting quality of life, but FDII had slightly more predictive power. It seems that the quality of life and severity of menopausal symptoms may be improved, particularly with regard to sexual symptoms, by following an anti-inflammatory diet.

Comparison of predictive effect of the dietary inflammatory index and empirically derived food-based dietary inflammatory index on the menopause-specific quality of life and its complications

INTRODUCTION

Menopause, defined as the cessation of menstruation for at least 12 months, is one of the important stages of a woman's life cycle. Some hormonal variations occur during the transition to menopause, which affects women's quality of life. Recently, the role of dietary factors in alleviating symptoms has been investigated.

AIM OF THIS STUDY

We tried to investigate the relationship between dietary inflammatory index (DII), food-based dietary inflammatory index (FDII) and quality of life, and menopausal symptoms, comparing their predictive power and suggesting the best cut-off point.

METHODOLOGY

One hundred forty-nine postmenopausal women were included in the cross-sectional study. After collecting data by interview, the desired variables were calculated. Logistic regression and ROC curves were used to investigate the relationship and predictive power of DII and FDII with menopausal symptoms.

FINDINGS

We observed that both DII and FDII were significantly associated with the severity of sexual symptoms. The first tertile of DII (OR = 0.252, P-value = 0.002) and FDII (OR = 0.316, P-value = 0.014) had a significantly lower odds ratio for severe to moderate symptoms compared to the third tertile. Both inflammatory indices had significant predictive power in predicting the probability of having severe to moderate poor quality of life (FDII (p-value = 0.004) > DII (p-value = 0.006)) and sexual symptoms (DII (p-value = 0.002) > FDII (p-value = 0.003)). Also, regarding the physical subtype, only FDII (p-value = 0.002) results were significant.

CONCLUSION

Both dietary inflammatory indices appear to be suitable for predicting quality of life, but FDII had slightly more predictive power. It seems that the quality of life and severity of menopausal symptoms may be improved, particularly with regard to sexual symptoms, by following an anti-inflammatory diet.

Is there any association between dietary inflammatory index and quality of life? A systematic review

Background

The inflammatory potential of unhealthy diets can lead to the development of chronic diseases and also exacerbating their complications. Therefore, the present systematic review aimed to evaluate the association of dietary inflammatory index (DII) and quality of life (QOL) in human subjects.

Methods

A systematic search was conducted in PubMed, Web of Science, and Scopus databases, using the combination of all search terms related to DII and QOL until May 2022. All eligible human studies published in English were included.

Results

Three hundred twenty-seven studies were obtained from the first systematic search of the databases although, only eight studies were eligible for the evaluation. Seven studies reported that there was a significant reverse association between DII scores and overall QOL and/or its subscales in different populations including patients with asthma, osteoarthritis, hemodialysis patients, multiple sclerosis, obese women, and also in healthy subjects. While, one study on postmenopausal women found no evidence of this association.

Conclusion

This systematic review demonstrated that an anti-inflammatory diet might be associated with better QOL. However, future well-designed clinical trials can provide better conclusions especially regarding the quantifying of this relationship.

The challenge of weight loss maintenance in obesity: a review of the evidence on the best strategies available

Long-term weight loss maintenance represents a big challenge for the management of obesity. This narrative review aims to provide an overview of the main endocrine mechanisms involved in weight regain in subjects with obesity and to review the current evidence on the best lifestyle approaches, including diet and physical activity. Weight regain after weight loss occurs in about 50% of subjects with obesity in the absence of lifestyle changes. The primary endocrine mechanism responsible for weight regain involves the brain-gut axis, which encourages food intake and thus weight regain through the secretion and action of several gastrointestinal hormones, such as ghrelin, leptin and cholecystokinin. Several evidence reported changes of secretion of these hormones during weight loss and weight loss maintenance programs. Endurance training is the most effective physical activity to lose and keep weight loss; the association of endurance with resistance training is recommended for remodelling body shape.

Association of Dietary Inflammatory Index (DII) and Depressive Disorders

A lot of evidence shows that inflammation is related to the development of depression. However, the heterogeneity of depression hinders efforts to understand, prevent and treat this disease. The purpose of this comprehensive review is to summarize the links between inflammation and the established core features of depression, which show more homogeneity than the syndrome itself: overreaction to negative information, changes in reward processing, and cognitive control decline, and somatic syndrome. For each core feature, we first briefly outline its relevance to depression and neurobiological basis, and then review the evidence to investigate the potential role of inflammation. We mainly focus on the discovery of the experimental paradigm of exogenous inflammation. We concluded that inflammation may play a role in overreaction to negative information, altered reward responses, and physical symptoms. There is less evidence to support the effect of inflammation on cognitive control by standard neuropsychological measures. Finally, we discussed the implications for future research and recommendations on how to test the role of inflammation in the pathogenesis of heterogeneous mental illness.