In a recent study published in JAMA Internal Medicine , researchers determined the relationship between animal and dietary plant fat intake with mortality from cardiovascular disease (CVD) and other causes. Background Dietary fats are crucial to maintaining cell membranes and metabolic fuel, absorbing and transporting fat-soluble vitamins, modulating ion channel activities, and regulating signal transduction. Plant-based fats contain more monounsaturated and polyunsaturated fat, while animal fats have a higher saturated fat content.
There is increased scientific interest in the effects of consuming dietary fats on health outcomes, which depend on food sources. However, limited data exists determining associations between dietary fat intake from various sources and human health. Although previous experimental and cross-national studies suggest that lowering dietary fat consumption is advantageous, recent cohort-based research, meta-analyses, and clinical trials provide conflicting results.
About the study In the present prospective cohort-type study, researchers investigated whether consuming fat from animal or plant sources could increase all-cause and CVD-specific mortality in the United States. The researchers obtained data from the National Institutes of Health (NIH)-AARP Diet and Health Study participants between 1995 and 2019 and analyzed data between February 2021 and May 2024. They used questionnaires to collect demographic, anthropometric, lifestyle, and dietary data,.