Abstract
Economic development in middle-income countries has led to a noticeable rise in the availability of commercial deep fried foods and lifestyles that require eating meals “on the go” and outside of the home. Yet, data from these countries where fried foods were traditionally prepared at home are scarce, despite several studies showing the potential adverse effects of fried food consumption on risk for heart disease. We aimed to examine whether consumption of fried foods inside or outside of the home is associated with an increased risk of myocardial infarction (MI) among Hispanic/Latinos living in Costa Rica. Participants were incident cases of a first acute MI (n = 2,154) and randomly selected controls matched for age, sex, and residence (n = 2,154). After adjustment for traditional cardiovascular risk factors, including history of diabetes, history of hypertension, smoking, abdominal obesity, income, educational years, occupation, alcohol intake, dietary intakes of saturated fatty acid, fiber intake, and total energy intake, the multivariable-adjusted odds ratio (OR, 95% CI) for risk of MI were 1.00 (reference), 1.02 (0.86–1.21), 1.26 (0.81–1.95), and 1.58 (1.08–2.30) for intake of fried foods outside of the home <1/week, 1-3/week, 4-6/week, and 1/day, respectively (P trend = 0.02); and 1.00, 0.81 (0.65–1.00), 0.81 (0.61–1.09), and 0.93 (0.72–1.19), respectively (P for trend = 0.65) for intake of fried foods inside the home. The data suggest that consumption of fried foods outside of the home, a practice that has been associated with economic development, could have adverse effects on cardiovascular disease.
Highlights
Food preparation and consumption in low- and middle-income countries has been restricted to the home
Since fried foods eaten away from home may have a unique impact on risk of myocardial infarction (MI) [11], the purpose of the present study was to examine whether intake of fried foods inside and outside the home is associated with the risk of MI in the Costa Rica Heart Study
A 27% increase in MI risk was found for those reporting only fried food intake outside of the home, whereas no association was found for those only reporting fried food intake inside the home. In this case control study conducted in the Central Valley of Costa Rica, higher intake of total fried foods was associated with increased risk of MI
Summary
Food preparation and consumption in low- and middle-income countries has been restricted to the home. Economic development in low- and middle-income countries has resulted in changes to food preparation and consumption, including higher intake of refined grains, sodium, and red meat [2,3]. These foods are characteristic of being highly processed and packaged for “on the go” eating or eating. Higher consumption of fried food outside the home, resulting from modernization, economic development and urbanization, could be associated with increased risk of cardiovascular disease CVD
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