By MARILYNN MARCHIONE
AP Chief Medical Writer
Deep-fried foods may be causing trouble in the Deep
South. People whose diets are heavy on them and sugary drinks like
sweet tea and soda were more likely to suffer a stroke, a new study
finds.
It's the first big look at diet and strokes, and
researchers say it might help explain why blacks in the Southeast - the
nation's "stroke belt" - suffer more of them.
Blacks were five times more likely than whites to
have the Southern dietary pattern linked with the highest stroke risk.
And blacks and whites who live in the South were more likely to eat this
way than people in other parts of the country were. Diet might explain
as much as two-thirds of the excess stroke risk seen in blacks versus
whites, researchers concluded.
"We're talking about fried foods, french fries,
hamburgers, processed meats, hot dogs," bacon, ham, liver, gizzards and
sugary drinks, said the study's leader, Suzanne Judd of the University
of Alabama in Birmingham.
People who ate about six meals a week featuring
these sorts of foods had a 41 percent higher stroke risk than people who
ate that way about once a month, researchers found.
In contrast, people whose diets were high in fruits, vegetables, whole grains and fish had a 29 percent lower stroke risk.
"It's a very big difference," Judd said. "The
message for people in the middle is there's a graded risk" - the
likelihood of suffering a stroke rises in proportion to each Southern
meal in a week.
Results were reported Thursday at an American Stroke Association conference in Honolulu.
The federally funded study was launched in 2002 to
explore regional variations in stroke risks and reasons for them. More
than 20,000 people 45 or older - half of them black - from all 48
mainland states filled out food surveys and were sorted into one of five
diet styles:
-Southern: Fried foods, processed meats (lunchmeat, jerky), red meat, eggs, sweet drinks and whole milk.
-Convenience: Mexican and Chinese food, pizza, pasta.
-Plant-based: Fruits, vegetables, juice, cereal, fish, poultry, yogurt, nuts and whole-grain bread.
-Sweets: Added fats, breads, chocolate, desserts, sweet breakfast foods.
-Alcohol: Beer, wine, liquor, green leafy vegetables, salad dressings, nuts and seeds, coffee.
"They're not mutually exclusive" - for example,
hamburgers fall into both convenience and Southern diets, Judd said.
Each person got a score for each diet, depending on how many meals
leaned that way.
Over more than five years of follow-up, nearly 500
strokes occurred. Researchers saw clear patterns with the Southern and
plant-based diets; the other three didn't seem to affect stroke risk.
There were 138 strokes among the 4,977 who ate the
most Southern food, compared to 109 strokes among the 5,156 people
eating the least of it.
There were 122 strokes among the 5,076 who ate the
most plant-based meals, compared to 135 strokes among the 5,056 people
who seldom ate that way.
The trends held up after researchers took into
account other factors such as age, income, smoking, education, exercise
and total calories consumed.
Fried foods tend to be eaten with lots of salt,
which raises blood pressure - a known stroke risk factor, Judd said. And
sweet drinks can contribute to diabetes, the disease that celebrity
chef Paula Deen - the queen of Southern cuisine - revealed she had a
year ago.
The National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke, drugmaker Amgen Inc. and General Mills Inc. funded the study.
"This study does strongly suggest that food does
have an influence and people should be trying to avoid these kinds of
fatty foods and high sugar content," said an independent expert, Dr.
Brian Silver, a Brown University neurologist and stroke center director
at Rhode Island Hospital.
"I don't mean to sound like an ogre. I know when
I'm in New Orleans I certainly enjoy the food there. But you don't have
to make a regular habit of eating all this stuff."
