How Effective is the Mediterranean Diet in Reducing the Risk Of Type 2 Diabetes? New Test Reveals

Researchers have developed a blood test-based biomarker score to measure adherence to the Mediterranean diet. Surprisingly, it shows that following this diet may reduce the risk of type 2 diabetes more than previously believed.

A team of researchers, led by Jakub Sobiecki from the University of Cambridge, UK, has made a significant breakthrough in the field of dietary assessment. They have developed an innovative method utilizing a blood test to determine whether an individual follows a Mediterranean diet.

Applying this novel approach, they have now presented compelling evidence that adherence to the Mediterranean diet is linked to a lower risk of type 2 diabetes.

These groundbreaking findings were recently published in the esteemed open-access journal PLOS Medicine.

The study addresses the longstanding question of the Mediterranean diet’s impact on type 2 diabetes risk. Previous studies have suggested a modest reduction in diabetes risk based on self-reported dietary habits. However, the subjectivity inherent in self-reports has left uncertainty surrounding this association. In an attempt to overcome this limitation, the researchers employed objective biological indicators, known as biomarkers, to evaluate adherence to the Mediterranean diet.

The team successfully identified 24 fatty acids and 5 carotenoids present in the blood that could predict adherence to the Mediterranean diet. These molecules were utilized to calculate a biomarker score, providing a quantifiable measure of the extent to which participants followed the Mediterranean diet.

In a subsequent large-scale study involving 340,234 individuals across eight European countries, the researchers assessed the biomarker scores of 9,453 participants who developed type 2 diabetes during the follow-up period, comparing them with 12,749 diabetes-free participants. The results were striking: individuals with higher biomarker scores, indicating greater adherence to the Mediterranean diet, demonstrated a significantly lower likelihood of developing type 2 diabetes.

To provide a comprehensive comparison, the researchers also incorporated self-reported dietary information from participants. Surprisingly, the biomarker score displayed a stronger association between the Mediterranean diet and reduced diabetes risk than the self-reported data. This suggests that previous studies relying solely on self-reports may have underestimated the true connection.

The implications of these findings are profound. The researchers contend that even a slight improvement in adherence to the Mediterranean diet could have a substantial impact on reducing the incidence of type 2 diabetes. However, they caution that further research is necessary to validate and expand upon these novel discoveries, as the specificity of the biomarker score for the Mediterranean diet remains unknown.

Senior author Professor Nita Forouhi commented,  “Our research combining information from a dietary clinical trial and a large cohort study to identify and apply blood biomarkers for a dietary pattern is exciting and should stimulate development of improved methods to study diet-disease associations which are typically limited by reliance on subjective recall of eating.”

This pioneering study opens up new avenues for understanding the Mediterranean diet’s potential in combating type 2 diabetes. By harnessing the power of biomarkers, researchers have taken a significant step towards objective dietary assessment and its implications for disease prevention.

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