Scientists found that individuals, whose diets were high in saturated fats and red meats, and low in leafy foods, will probably develop depression. Eating a diet of vegetables, fruit and whole grains might be a simple method to combat depression, a new study suggests.
Specialists in the US followed nearly 1,000 people of an average age of 81 for over six years monitoring their diet and mood. They found that individuals who avoided red meat, saturated fats, and sugar, and stuck to healthy vegetables, fruit, and whole grains, were 11 percent less likely to be suffering depression by the end of the study.
“Depression is common in older adults and more frequent in individuals with memory problems, vascular risk factors such as hypertension or high cholesterol, or people who have had a stroke,” said study author Dr. Laurel Cherian, of Rush University Medical Center in Chicago and a member from the American Academy of Neurology.
“Making way of life improvement such as changing your diet is often preferred over taking drugs, so we wanted to see whether diet could be a viable method to decrease the risk of depression.”
Over one of every five people in Britain suffers from depression and medicines for antidepressants are at an all-time high. The latest information from NHS Digital demonstrates the health service issues around 64 million prescriptions every year at a cost of £9.2 billion. A decade ago was prescribing was less than half of the present rate.
During the study period, participants were monitored for symptoms of depression such as being bothered by things that as a rule didn’t influence them and feeling sad about what’s to come.
They also filled out surveys about how frequently they ate different foods, and the scientists looked at how closely the participants’ diets followed regimes such as Dash (Dietary approaches to stop hypertension), which suggests low-fat foods, or the traditional Western diet, which is high in fat and sugar.
People in the groups that followed Dash most closely were less likely to develop depression than individuals in the group that did not take the diet closely. Conversely, the more closely individuals took after a Western diet – a diet that is high in saturated fats and red meats and low in leafy foods – the more probable they were to develop depression.
“Future studies are currently needed to affirm these outcomes and to determine the best nutritious parts of the DASH diet to prevent depression later in life and to best help individuals to keep their brains healthy,” included Dr. Cherian. The research was presented at the American Academy of Neurology’s Annual Meeting in Los Angeles.