Dietary antioxidant vitamins and fiber in the etiology of cardiovascular disease and all-causes mortality: results from the Scottish Heart Health Study.

In this paper, data obtained between 1984 and 1993 from 11,629 men and women as part of the Scottish Heart Health Study (Scotland, United Kingdom) were used to investigate the relation between antioxidant vitamin and fiber intakes and both incident coronary heart disease (CHD) (649 events) and all-causes mortality (591 deaths). All age-adjusted mean intakes tended to be higher in the group that experienced no event. For men, increased fiber intake was associated with decreased risk of CHD even after adjustment for a host of other major coronary risk factors; hazard ratios relative to the lowest quarter were 0.68, 0.70, and 0.64 by increasing quarter. This relation was also observed for mortality (hazard ratios of 0.62, 0.66, and 0.62). Evidence was found that higher intakes of the antioxidants were also beneficial, although the associations were weaker. For women, fiber was the only obviously influential dietary factor, with hazard ratios of 0.94, 0.60, and 0.56 for CHD and 1.25, 0.82, and 0.65 for mortality. These results suggest that the current public health drive to increase the consumption of foods rich in antioxidant vitamins and (particularly) fiber will impact on both CHD risk and the general health of the population.