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 Compared to people who didn’t follow a Mediterranean diet pattern,
those who adhered to it most closely had a significantly lower
likelihood of needing a cholecystectomy, which is the medical term
for an operation to remove the gallbladder, say the authors.
“We found that higher intakes of legumes, fruit, vegetable oil, and
(whole grain) bread were associated with decreased cholecystectomy
risk, and a higher intake of ham was associated with higher risk of
cholecystectomy,” wrote the authors in the American Journal of
Gastroenterology.
About 700,000 cholecystectomies are performed every year in the
United States, according to the American College of Surgeons. Most
are the result of blockage due to gallstones.
“Gallstones are very common, but most of them are asymptomatic,
meaning people have no symptoms. If you don't have any symptoms from
your gallstones, there's no reason to have your gallbladder
removed,” said Dr. James Lewis, a gastroenterologist at the
University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia who was not part of the
study.
The vast majority of people with gallstones never have problems from
them, Lewis said in a phone interview.
“When they do cause problems, then having your gallbladder removed
is completely appropriate,” he said.
The new study, led by Dr. Amelie Barre at the University of Paris
Sud in Orsay, used information on nearly 64,000 women who were born
between 1925 and 1950 and covered by a national insurance plan.
Every two years, they answered questions about their health status,
medical history, and lifestyle.
Over the course of 18 years, 2,778 of the women had their
gallbladder removed.
Women who ate the most legumes, fruits, vegetable oil, and whole
grain bread were anywhere from 13 to 27 percent less likely to have
gallbladder surgery than were women who ate the least of those
foods.
A western dietary pattern - including high consumption of processed
meat, canned fish, eggs, rice, pasta, appetizers, pizza, potatoes,
cakes, and alcohol - was not linked with either a higher or lower
risk for the surgery. There was, however, an association of ham
intake with cholecystectomy risk.
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But when researchers assigned a Mediterranean diet score to all
participants, they found that women with the highest scores were 11
percent less likely to have the surgery compared to women with the
lowest scores.
This type of observational study can’t prove that a Mediterranean
diet was the reason for women’s lower risk of gallbladder surgery,
or that ham intake caused a higher risk. Furthermore, dietary
intakes were self-reported at just one point in time. The reports
may not have been accurate, and women’s diets may have changed over
time.
Still, Lewis said, the Mediterranean-style diet has consistently
been shown to be associated with living longer.
“If people really want to think about what they should be eating in
order to increase their longevity, it's very easy for me to
recommend to them that they should try and follow a
Mediterranean-style diet,” he said.
In fact, the U.S. Department of Agriculture recently advised
Americans to follow a diet that is very similar to a
Mediterranean-style diet, Lewis noted. (http://bit.ly/2vHSL8h)
“This is just one of many reasons that we should be following that
style diet. If you look at the published literature on dietary
patterns, what you'll see is that Mediterranean-style diet has been
associated with a reduced overall mortality but also reduced
cardiovascular mortality (and) reduced risks of cancer,” he said.
SOURCE: http://go.nature.com/2wpsVSL The American Journal of
Gastroenterology, online July 25, 2017.
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