Carbs & cardiovascular disease

Introduction

This week’s paper was found by my most prolific anonymous paper finder. He knows who he is – thank you. It’s another paper based on the UK Biobank study. It was called “Associations between types and sources of dietary carbohydrates and cardiovascular disease risk: a prospective cohort study of UK Biobank participants” and it was by Kelly et al (Ref 1).

The UK Biobank study population recruited 503,317 men and women, aged 37 to 73 years, between 2006 and 2010. Eligible adults living within 25 miles of 22 assessment centres across England, Wales and Scotland were identified from National Health Service (NHS) registers and invited to participate in the study. There were 9.2 million people eligible. The response rate was 5.5%. The usual diet, lifestyle and sociodemographic characteristics were recorded at baseline. Physical measurements and biological samples were also taken.

The original dietary information came from a 24-hour dietary assessment (Ref 2). Participants who provided a valid email address at recruitment were invited to complete identical 24-hour dietary assessments on four further occasions between February 2011 and April 2012.

Intakes of 206 food items and 32 drinks were collated from the responses to each 24-hour dietary assessment. The UK Nutrient Databank food composition tables were used to calculate the carbohydrate intake of food items (Ref 3).