Healthy Plant-Based Diet Leaves a Blood Signature Linked to 23% Lower Diabetes Risk

A healthy plant-based diet leaves a distinct chemical signature in the blood, and having more of it is linked to a lower risk of type 2 diabetes, Harvard researchers have found. Each step up in the healthy plant-based profile was linked to a 23% lower risk.

The team at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health measured plasma metabolites in 10,684 people from the Nurses' Health Studies and the Health Professionals Follow-up Study, and matched them to diets scored on healthy and unhealthy plant-based indexes. The study is published in Diabetologia.

They identified a profile of 93 metabolites tied to a healthy plant-based diet. Each standard-deviation increase in it was linked to 23% lower diabetes risk, and the overall plant-based profile to 19% lower risk. The profile of an unhealthy plant-based diet, heavy on refined grains and sugary drinks, showed no benefit. Compounds such as trigonelline and hippurate helped explain the link.

While it is difficult to tease out the contributions of individual foods because they were analysed together as a pattern, individual metabolites from consumption of polyphenol-rich plant foods like fruits, vegetables, coffee, and legumes are all closely linked to healthy plant-based diet and lower risk of diabetes.

That is senior author Professor Frank Hu, in the Diabetologia release.

It fits with the Harvard meta-analysis linking plant-based diets to 23% lower type 2 diabetes risk and last year's study of 192,000 people linking healthy plant foods to lower diabetes risk.

Fruit, veg, coffee and beans: your blood keeps the score.