Food & disease risk
Feeding adults with type 2 diabetes a DASH-style diet lowered three separate blood sugar markers
The DASH diet was built for blood pressure. A version tailored for diabetes was tested by cooking every meal for 101 people, which removes the usual problem of not knowing what anyone actually ate.
Sep 8, 2026
Extra protein failed to build muscle in cancer patients whose inflammation was already high
Protein advice for cancer patients is given as a single number for everyone. Tracking 50 people with colorectal cancer found that what their blood was doing beforehand largely decided whether it worked.
Sep 8, 2026
B vitamins tracked slightly less breast cancer, but not in women drinking more than a glass a day
Folate and its relatives have been circling breast cancer research for decades without resolving. A nested study found small protective associations, and found they disappeared above a specific drinking threshold.
Sep 6, 2026
Meals built from traditional foods cut heart failure hospital visits by more than a quarter
Medically tailored meals usually mean someone else's idea of healthy food. A trial in 206 American Indian patients with heart failure built the meals from foods the community already eats, and counted what happened.
Sep 6, 2026
Saturated fat tracked 24% more deaths after prostate cancer, but not from the cancer
Most men diagnosed with early prostate cancer do not die of it. Following 4,884 of them for over a decade, what they ate afterwards moved every cause of death except the one they were treated for.
Sep 4, 2026
Moderate drinking tracked lower heart risk and higher cancer risk in the same 438,442 people
The alcohol argument usually picks one disease and stops there. Following 438,442 US veterans, moderate drinking sat at the bottom of the curve for heart events and death, while cancer risk climbed in a straight line from the first drink.
Sep 2, 2026
Every extra 100g of fruit and vegetables a day after diagnosis tracked 9% fewer bladder cancer recurrences
Bladder cancer comes back more often than almost any other cancer, and patients are given no dietary advice at all. In 1,396 Dutch patients followed nearly five years, what they ate after diagnosis tracked their recurrence risk.
Sep 1, 2026
The best diet-and-sleep combination tracked 43% less lung cancer across 192,034 people
Diet and sleep are usually studied one at a time. Scoring both together in the UK Biobank and following people for 14 years, the group with the best Mediterranean diet and the best sleep had the lowest lung cancer risk by a wide margin.
Sep 1, 2026
Nuts tracked 26% lower risk of high blood pressure across 8 studies and 20,665 cases
A British Journal of Nutrition review pooled eight cohort studies and 20,665 new cases of high blood pressure. Eating about 30 grams of nuts a day went with roughly a quarter less risk, and the authors graded the case for cause as probable.
Aug 26, 2026
The Portfolio diet tracked 10% lower death risk across 513,284 people in four cohorts
A Critical Reviews in Food Science and Nutrition analysis pooled 10 studies of the cholesterol-lowering Portfolio diet. Each step up the adherence score went with 6% less cardiovascular disease and 10% lower all-cause mortality.
Aug 26, 2026
More fish was not better: the lowest deaths sat mid-range
A Japanese cohort of 90,944 adults found the lowest all-cause mortality in women eating the second-highest amount of fish, not the highest. In men the benefit appeared only for stroke deaths, and only for unsalted fish.
Aug 14, 2026
Mediterranean diet beat low-fat on 20-year heart risk
Researchers emulated a trial in 12,197 higher-risk US adults from two Harvard cohorts. Estimated 20-year cardiovascular risk was 28.2% on a Mediterranean diet against 35.9% on a low-fat one.
Aug 6, 2026
Anti-inflammatory diet linked to longer life after cancer
In 7,686 Swedish patients with cancer of the prostate, bladder or kidney, those eating a more anti-inflammatory diet beforehand were less likely to die of anything. The link to dying of the cancer itself was weak.
Aug 4, 2026
Diet and exercise cut disease risk whatever the scale says
A study in The Lancet Regional Health - Americas followed 142,041 US adults. Those highest for activity and diet quality had 46% lower chronic disease risk, and the effect held after accounting for body weight at several life stages.
Aug 4, 2026
Who benefits from cutting salt varies 15-fold
Guidelines tell everyone to eat less sodium. Pooling 160 studies, researchers found blood pressure response depends heavily on age, starting pressure and body weight.
Aug 2, 2026
Cutting alcohol in midlife showed no breast cancer benefit yet
EPIC researchers tracked drinking changes in 123,679 European women. Four years after the change, postmenopausal breast cancer risk had not moved either way.
Jul 31, 2026
A plant-based pattern cut 20-year heart disease risk by 26%
Greek researchers followed 1,988 adults for two decades and found the diet that was best for the planet was also best for the heart. The Western pattern showed nothing.
Jul 31, 2026
The traditional Chinese diet tracked with fewer deaths, more obesity
A European Journal of Nutrition study of 11,158 Chinese adults found high adherence to the traditional diet linked to lower heart disease and death rates, and higher obesity rates.
Jul 29, 2026
Food insecurity tracked with missed cancer screening
A JAMA Network Open analysis of 251,107 US adults found people facing food insecurity were less likely to be up to date on cancer screening, and looked at whether SNAP narrowed the gap.
Jul 29, 2026
Salt tracked with diabetes risk, measured in urine
A Diabetes Care study measured sodium in repeat 24-hour urine samples from 3,173 adults and found the highest intakes carried 2.66 times the risk of developing type 2 diabetes.
Jul 29, 2026
Hitting the wholegrain target tracked with less breast cancer
A European Journal of Nutrition study followed 36,479 Swedish women for a mean 16.5 years and found those eating at least 90 g of wholegrains a day had lower breast cancer rates.
Jul 29, 2026
Sugary drinks tied to liver cancer; diet versions were not
A pooled analysis of 11 cohorts and 1.5 million adults in JAMA Network Open linked each daily sugary drink to higher liver cancer risk, while artificially sweetened drinks showed no association.
Jul 26, 2026
Alcohol tied to cancer risk below one drink a day
A re-analysis of 843 studies across 20 health conditions tied alcohol to higher risk for ten cancers at any level, while its links to heart and metabolic disease were mixed. These were observational studies, so associations, not proof.
Jul 23, 2026
Does sauerkraut fight inflammation? A trial says mostly no
A randomized crossover trial in 87 healthy adults found daily sauerkraut did little for inflammation or the gut barrier over four weeks. The one signal, a small drop in blood pressure, showed up even when the bacteria were dead.
Jul 23, 2026