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Background: Current evidence on tea consumption and hypertension is inconclusive, and prospective studies among habitual tea drinkers remain limited.Objective: We investigated the associations of habitual tea consumption with hypertension risk and longitudinal blood pressure changes in 2 large cohorts.Methods: This study included participants aged 40-75 y from the Shanghai Women's Health Study (n = 31,351) and the Shanghai Men's Health Study (n = 28,342), without hypertension, diabetes, cardiovascular disease, or cancer at baseline. Information on tea consumption was assessed during in-person interviews at enrollment and follow-up visits. Incident hypertension was identified by self-reported diagnosis, medication use, or blood pressure measurements.Results: Current tea drinkers had a 7% higher risk than the non-current tea drinker group [HRs (95% CIs): women, 1.07 (1.01, 1.14); men, 1.07 (1.02, 1.12)]. The amount of tea drinking showed significant dose-response associations with hypertension: compared with the non-current group, HRs (95% CIs) for women and men were 1.01 (0.90, 1.14) and 1.02 (0.96, 1.08) for low (women/men: <100/200 g/mo), 1.07 (1.01, 1.15) and 1.05 (0.99, 1.12) for medium (women/men: 100-250/200-250 g/mo), and 1.18 (1.01, 1.39) and 1.10 (1.03, 1.17) for the high-amount group (women/men: >250 g/mo). Among participants without hypertension, compared with non-current tea drinkers, least-squares means of 3-y changes in blood pressure were 0.3-0.4 mm Hg higher for women and men as current drinkers and 0.7-0.9 mm Hg higher for men in the high-consumption group. Compared with those who never drank tea, women who drank tea consistently had 0.5 (0.2, 0.7) mm Hg higher diastolic blood pressure (DBP), whereas men had 0.5 (0.04, 0.9) mm Hg higher systolic blood pressure and 0.3 (0.04, 0.6) mm Hg higher DBP, respectively.Conclusions: Our findings suggest that habitual tea drinking is associated with a slightly higher risk of hypertension and a minor increase in blood pressure among middle-aged and older Chinese adults, which warrants confirmation by long-term intervention studies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background Few population-based studies have evaluated the influence of long-term diet on the gut microbiome, and data among Asian populations are lacking. Objective We examined the association of long-term diet quality, comprising 8 food groups (fruit, vegetables, dairy, fish/seafood, nuts/legumes, refined grains, red meat, and processed meat), with gut microbiome among Chinese adults. Methods Included were 1920 men and women, enrolled in 2 prospective cohorts (baseline 1996–2006), who remained free of cardiovascular diseases, diabetes, and cancer at stool collection (2015–2018) and had no diarrhea or antibiotic use in the last 7 d before stool collection. Microbiome was profiled by 16S rRNA sequencing. Long-term diet was assessed by repeated surveys at baseline and follow-ups (1996–2011), with intervals of 5.2 to 20.5 y between dietary surveys and stool collection. Associations of dietary variables with microbiome diversity and composition were evaluated by linear or negative binomial hurdle models, adjusting for potential confounders. False discovery rate (FDR) <0.1 was considered significant. Results The mean ± SD age at stool collection was 68 ± 1.5 y. Diet quality was positively associated with microbiome α-diversity (P  = 0.03) and abundance of Firmicutes, Actinobacteria, Tenericutes , and genera/species within these phyla, including Coprococcus, Faecalibacterium / Faecalibacterium prausnitzii, Bifidobacterium / Bifidobacterium adolescentis , and order RF39 (all FDRs <0.1). Significant associations were also observed for intakes of dairy, fish/seafood, nuts/legumes, refined grains, and processed meat, including a positive association of dairy with Bifidobacterium and inverse associations of processed meat with Roseburia / Roseburia faecis. Most associations were similar, with or without adjustment for BMI and hypertension status or excluding participants with antibiotic use in the past 6 mo. Conclusion Among apparently healthy Chinese adults, long-term diet quality is positively associated with fecal microbiome diversity and abundance of fiber-fermenting bacteria, although magnitudes are generally small. Future studies are needed to examine if these bacteria may mediate or modify diet–disease relations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objectives: To evaluate the association between sleep duration and the incidence of diabetes stratified by sleep-related factors among Chinese men.Methods: This study included 34,825 men who provided information on sleep-related questions in the Shanghai Men's Health Study, a population-based cohort study conducted in Shanghai, China from 2002 to 2011. Participants were excluded who had a history of diabetes or who were diagnosed with diabetes within 2 years of recruitment. Cox regression was employed to evaluate the influence of sleep duration and its interaction with sleep-related factors on diabetes risk.Results: A total of 1521 incident cases were documented during a median of 5.6 follow-up years. Adjusted hazard ratios and 95% confidence intervals were 1.0 (0.9-1.1) and 1.2 (1.0-1.3) for men who slept <7 and ≥8 h per day, respectively, compared with those who slept 7 h per day (ptrend = 0.01). Stratified analyses revealed that the association between sleep duration and risk of diabetes was only statistically significant among current smokers and regular drinkers, never tea drinkers, men with a high body mass index, hypertension or comorbidity, and men who did not work nightshift or who snored. A statistically significant interaction between tea drinking and sleep duration was observed (pinteraction = 0.01). The above association patterns remained when daytime nappers were excluded from the analyses.Conclusions: The data suggested that longer sleep duration, particularly among individuals already exhibiting factors linked to poor quality of sleep, was associated with diabetes. The association between sleep duration and diabetes may be modified by tea drinking, especially in older men or men with more sleep-related factors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective: To examine the associations between anthropometric measurements and functional impairments in a sample of urban elderly Chinese people.Methods: In two population-based cohort studies, the Shanghai Women's Health Study (SWHS) and Shanghai Men's Health Study (SMHS), 11,505 men and 17,166 women aged 70-88 years at the time of the functional assessment were studied. Weight history was collected and anthropometric data were taken at study enrollment (from 1996 to 2000 for the SWHS, 2002-2006 for the SMHS). Information on functional status and current weight was collected at the most recent follow-up survey (from 2011 to 2015). Logistic regression analyses were applied to estimate the associations of body mass index (BMI), waist-hip-ratio (WHR), and weight changes with functional decline.Results: After a median follow-up of 14.4 years (range 5.4-18.2 years), we found that BMI/WHR at or after middle age, and weight gain during adulthood were significantly associated with impaired walking ability and mental functioning. Being underweight after age 70 was associated with poorer hearing and/or vision as well as poorer memory. The associations between obesity and functional impairment were generally not modified by sex, comorbidity or exercise.Conclusion: Weight gain, obesity at or after middle age, and underweight after age 70 were associated with physical and mental functional impairments among elderly Chinese people. These findings highlight the importance of maintaining healthy weight to reduce age-related functional decline. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: Background: Soy and some of its constituents, such as isoflavones, have been shown to affect the inflammatory process in animal studies. The association between soy food intake and inflammatory markers has not been evaluated adequately in humans. Objective: Our aim was to evaluate whether higher intake of soy foods was inversely associated with inflammatory markers in 1,005 middle-aged Chinese women. Design: In this cross-sectional study, dietary intake of soy foods was assessed by a validated food frequency questionnaire and by a 24-hour recall when biospecimens were procured. A general linear model was used to estimate the geometric means of selected inflammatory markers, including interleukin-6 (IL-6), IL-1β, tumor necrosis factor-α (TNFα), soluble IL-6 receptor, soluble GP130, soluble TNF receptors 1 and 2, and C-reactive protein, across categories of soy food intake after adjusting for age, lifestyle and dietary factors, and history of infectious or inflammation-related diseases. Results: We found that multivariable-adjusted geometric mean concentrations of IL-6 and TNFα were inversely associated with quintiles of soy food intake, with a difference between the highest and lowest quintiles of 25.5% for IL-6 (P for trend=0.008) and 14% for TNFα (P for trend=0.04). Similar inverse associations were found for TNFα (P for trend=0.003), soluble TNF receptor 1 (P for trend=0.01), soluble TNF receptor 2 (P for trend=0.02), IL-1β (P for trend=0.05), and IL-6 (P for trend=0.04) when soy food consumption was assessed by the frequency of consumption in the preceding 24 hours. No significant associations were found for other markers studied. Conclusions: This study suggests that soy food consumption is related to lower circulating levels of IL-6, TNFα, and soluble TNF receptors 1 and 2 in Chinese women. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]