Evaluation of Dietary Selenium Intake and New-Onset Hypertension：A Nationwide Cohort Study in China

Abstract

Aims: There are few prospective studies exploring the association between dietary selenium intake and hypertension. We aimed to evaluate the relationship of dietary selenium intake with new-onset hypertension, using data from China Health and Nutrition Survey (CHNS), a nationwide cohort study. Methods: A total of 12,245 participants who were free of hypertension at baseline were enrolled from CHNS from 1997-2015. Dietary intake was measured by three consecutive 24-h dietary recalls at individual level in combination with a weighing inventory over the same 3 days at household level. New-onset hypertension was defined as systolic blood pressure ≥140mmHg and/or diastolic blood pressure ≥90mmHg or diagnosed by physician or currently under antihypertensive treatment during the follow-up. Results: The mean age of the study population was 41.2 (SD, 14.2) years, 5,728 (46.8%) were male. During a median follow-up duration of 6.1 years, new-onset hypertension occurred in 4304 (35.1%) participants. Overall, there was a significant nonlinear association between dietary selenium intake and new-onset hypertension (P value for nonlinearity<0.001). The risk of new-onset hypertension was increased only in participants with relatively lower intake of selenium. Consistently, when dietary selenium intake was assessed as quartiles, a significantly lower risk of new-onset hypertension (HR, 0.67; 95%CI: 0.62-0.72) was found in participants in quartiles 2-4, compared with those in quartile 1 (<31.8 μg/day). Conclusions: There was an inverse association between dietary selenium intake and new-onset hypertension in general Chinese adults. Our results emphasized the importance of maintaining optimal dietary selenium intake levels for primary prevention of hypertension. Funding Statement: The study was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China [81973133, 81730019]; Outstanding Youths Development Scheme of Nanfang Hospital, Southern Medical University [2017J009]; the Research Fund Program of Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of Renal Failure Research; and Clinical Innovation Research Program of Guangzhou Regenerative Medicine and Health Guangdong Laboratory [2018ZR0201003]. Declaration of Interests: The authors declare that they have no competing interests. Ethics Approval Statement: The institutional review boards of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and the National Institute of Nutrition and Food Safety, and Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention, approved the study. Each CHNS participant provided their written informed consent.