Effect of dietary diversity on incident of disability in community-dwelling older adults with sarcopenia: A 40-month follow-up longitudinal study

Background Sarcopenia is a clinical issue in older adults that leads to serious adverse health outcomes, including disability. The present study investigated whether dietary diversity affects the incidence of disability in older adults with sarcopenia. Method Participants were 759 Japanese older adults with sarcopenia (mean age 77.2 ± 6.0 years; 44.4 % men) who were aged ≥65 years at the time of the examination. Sarcopenia was diagnosed according to the recommendations of the European Working Group on Sarcopenia in Older People 2. Dietary diversity was assessed using a diet variety score. This diet variety score assessed the one-week consumption frequency of ten food groups, according to the following responses: “eat almost every day” (1 point), or “not eaten almost daily” (0 points). Older adults with a diet variety score of 3 or more points were defined as having high dietary diversity. Incident disability was certified by long-term care insurance (mean follow-up duration 32 months). Results The cumulative disability incidence rates in the older adults with low dietary diversity and high dietary diversity were 23.3 % and 16.9 %, respectively. Cox proportional hazards regression analysis revealed high dietary diversity was associated with a lower risk of incident disability in older adults with sarcopenia (hazard ratio 0.66, 95 % confidence interval 0.47–0.92; p = 0.015), after adjusting for covariates. Conclusions This longitudinal study revealed that high dietary diversity is associated with a lower risk of incident disability among sarcopenic Japanese older adults.