Health
Simple dinner table habit linked to poor diet and higher health risks in adults over 60
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Reaching for the salt shaker at the kitchen table may seem like second nature for some – but it could reveal troubling details about your health.
Recent Brazilian research, published in the journal Frontiers in Public Health, investigated the impact of adding salt to food with a focus on older adults.
The study used national survey data from more than 8,000 Brazilians over the age of 60, collected between 2017 and 2018.
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Participants were asked the question, “Do you have the habit of adding salt to food at the table?” The researchers then deciphered certain traits that were linked to the habit.
About 10.9% of older adults said they used salt at the table. Men reported this habit more than women – 12.7% compared to 9.4%, according to the published study.
About 10.9% of older adults said they used salt at the table in a recent Brazilian survey. (iStock)
Men not following a diet for high blood pressure were more than twice as likely to add salt compared to men who follow this diet.
Men who reported living alone had a 62% higher likelihood of using salt compared to men who lived with others.
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Women not following a high blood pressure diet had 68% higher likelihood of using extra salt.
Adding salt was also associated with a lower intake of fruits and vegetables among women. The odds of adding salt to food were 81% higher in women who did not eat fruit, and 40% higher in those who did not eat vegetables.
Women who have a high concentration of ultraprocessed foods in their diet were more than twice as likely to add salt to food, as were those living in urban areas.
Women who added salt were less likely to eat fruits and vegetables, the data showed. (iStock)
As this study was cross-sectional, it showed an association but could not prove that one thing caused another, the researchers acknowledged. Some of the information was self-reported, which could also limit the findings.
Diets high in sodium are known to cause an increase in blood pressure, which also raises the risk of heart disease, gastric cancer, obesity, osteoporosis and kidney disease, according to the World Health Organization.
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About 1.89 million deaths each year are associated with consuming too much sodium, the organization reported.
The WHO recommends that adults consume less than 5 grams of salt per day, or just under a teaspoon, for best health outcomes.
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Study co-author Dr. Débora Santos, a titular professor at Rio de Janeiro State University, called for alternative ways to decrease additional use of salt.
“The use of herbs and natural seasonings as alternatives to salt, or culinary techniques such as using the acidity of citrus fruits, may help reduce discretionary salt use while maintaining food palatability,” she wrote in a press release.
“Practical strategies, such as avoiding the routine placement of saltshakers on the table, may also help reduce habitual salt use.”
About 1.89 million deaths each year are associated with consuming too much sodium, the organization reported. (iStock)
Los Angeles-based registered dietitian nutritionist Ilana Muhlstein said adding salt to food before trying it is one of her “biggest pet peeves.”
“It’s interesting that this study found that men were significantly more likely to add salt to their food compared to women, because this is an observation I’ve had as well,” Muhlstein, who was not involved in the study, told Fox News Digital.
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“It could be because women are more bloat-conscious overall and may be more informed on the medical harms of excessive salt, as well as the more superficial ones like making your rings hard to take on or off (when you’re dealing with water retention from increased salt intake).”
For men, Muhlstein suggested that those who live alone are potentially more likely to order takeout – and restaurants “tend to use much more salt than home cooking, which could make someone’s preference for salty food much higher.”
“Public health officials [should] promote nutrition education and the importance of whole foods, less processed foods and reduced salt intake overall,” a nutritionist said. (iStock)
“That is further reflected in the stats showing that the less fruits and vegetables one eats, and the more processed foods consumed, the more likely one was to add salt to their food,” she noted.
The finding that a low blood pressure diet positively influences a person’s salt intake is “promising and intriguing,” according to Muhlstein.
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“This should encourage HHS and public health officials to promote nutrition education and the importance of whole foods, less processed foods and reduced salt intake overall,” she said.
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High-dose vitamin D supplements could help reduce diabetes risk among certain groups, according to new research from Tufts University.
In a large clinical trial, researchers performed genetic testing of more than 2,000 U.S. adults with prediabetes after they received 4,000 units per day of vitamin D supplements, then compared them to a placebo group.
An earlier study showed no significant reduction in diabetes risk in the group receiving vitamin D supplementation, but when the researchers looked closer, they found a benefit for certain genetic groups.
High-dose vitamin D supplements could help reduce diabetes risk among certain groups, according to new research from Tufts University. (iStock)
For the new study, the Tufts researchers compared participants who appeared to benefit from vitamin D supplementation to those who did not, then examined how outcomes differed across three common variants of the vitamin D receptor gene.
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People who had certain versions of a vitamin D-related gene (called AC or CC) were 19% less likely to get diabetes when they took vitamin D compared to people who took a placebo, according to a university press release.
Participants with another genetic variant (AA) showed no benefit from supplementation.
People who had certain versions of a vitamin D-related gene (called AC or CC) were 19% less likely to get diabetes when they took vitamin D compared to people who took a placebo. (iStock)
Vitamin D seems to work by attaching to a specific “receiver” in the body called the vitamin D receptor, the researchers discovered. These receptors are found in many places, including the pancreas, the organ that makes insulin.
The findings were published last week in JAMA Network Open.
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“Our finding is an example of the emerging science of precision nutrition or precision medicine, in which an intervention can be tailored to the needs of individuals according to their genetic makeup and disease risk,” Bess Dawson-Hughes, the study’s lead author and a senior scientist at the Jean Mayer USDA Human Nutrition Research Center on Aging at Tufts University, told Fox News Digital.
“Taking a vitamin D supplement daily is an easy, inexpensive and generally safe approach to reducing diabetes risk,” she added. “In principle, this could involve a single, relatively inexpensive genetic test.”
“It is too early to make specific recommendations for the general population.”
There were some limitations to the study, the researchers noted, including that this was a secondary analysis rather than a primary randomized comparison.
“Like any other first observation, this finding needs to be replicated in a future study,” the researcher said.
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The study only included individuals with prediabetes, which could limit relevance to broader populations. The results seen in specific genetic groups need to be confirmed in more studies before doctors can use them in patient care.
“I would not advise older adults to take a daily dose of 4,000 IU of vitamin D without first consulting with their doctors,” the researchers said. (iStock)
The authors emphasized that people should not start taking high doses of vitamin D as a diabetes prevention strategy based on this study.
“It is too early to make specific recommendations for the general population,” Dawson-Hughes said.
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Current recommendations suggest that most adults get about 600 IU of vitamin D daily (ages 1–70) and 800 IU for those over 70. However, previous studies have shown that taking very high doses can be harmful for older adults.
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“There is some evidence, from my laboratory and others, that the relatively high blood levels of 25-hydroxyvitamin D needed to achieve the diabetes risk reduction have been associated with an increased risk of falling in older adults,” Dawson-Hughes noted.
“I would not advise older adults to take a daily dose of 4,000 IU of vitamin D without first consulting with their doctors.”
Adults with prediabetes also have an increased risk of cardiovascular disease, the researcher noted. (iStock)
This new study raises another question, according to Dawson-Hughes: Would vitamin D supplementation in adults with the responsive genotypes lower the risk of developing prediabetes, the forerunner to Type 2 diabetes?
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“This is important because prediabetes is not a benign condition,” she said. “Adults with prediabetes also have an increased risk of cardiovascular disease.”
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