Dietary seaweed intake and depressive symptoms in Japanese adults: a prospective cohort study

Feng Guo,Yufei Cui,Cong Huang,Kaijun Niu,Haruki Momma,Ryoichi Nagatomi

doi:10.1186/s12937-019-0486-7

Abstract

BackgroundThis prospective cohort study aimed to investigate the association between daily seaweed intake and depressive symptoms.MethodsIn a prospective study conducted between 2008 and 2011, 500 Japanese adult employees aged 20–74 years participated and were included in the final analysis. Consumption of seaweed was assessed using a brief self-administered diet history questionnaire, and changes in seaweed consumption were divided into three categories (decreased, unchanged, and increased). Depressive symptoms were assessed using a Japanese version of the Self-Rating Depression Scale (SDS). Depressive symptoms were defined as an SDS score of ≥50 in the present study.ResultsAt the 3-year follow-up, 46 participants (9.2%) showed depressive symptoms. Multivariate analysis showed that baseline seaweed intakes were not significantly associated with the incidence of depressive symptoms (p for trend = 0.501). Conversely, odds ratios (95% CI) for depressive symptoms were lower in the participants who had higher seaweed intake than in those who had lower seaweed intake (decreased, 1.00; unchanged, 0.32 [0.13–0.81]; increased, 0.34 [0.13–0.88]; p for trend = 0.032) after adjusting for confounding factors.ConclusionsThis study revealed a relationship between higher seaweed intake and a lower incidence of depressive symptoms in Japanese adults.

Highlights

Depression is a common mental disorder, and the incidence of depressive illness has been steadily increasing over the past two decades [1]
This study revealed a relationship between higher seaweed intake and a lower incidence of depressive symptoms in Japanese adults
Effective treatments are available for depression, evidence shows that the recurrence rate for major depressive disorders in the general population is

Summary

Introduction

Depression is a common mental disorder, and the incidence of depressive illness has been steadily increasing over the past two decades [1]. Some studies have focused on the association between diet and depressive symptoms and indicated that a healthy Japanese dietary pattern, characterized by a high intake of vegetables, mushrooms, soy products, and seaweeds, was associated with a lower prevalence of depressive symptoms [7, 8]. Among these food items of the traditional Japanese dietary pattern, which includes. This prospective cohort study aimed to investigate the association between daily seaweed intake and depressive symptoms

Methods

Results

Conclusion