Frequent consumption of meals prepared outside the home associated with an increased risk of death

Dining out is a popular activity worldwide, but there is little research on its association with health outcomes. The researchers looked at the association between eating out and the risk of death and concluded that eating out too often is significantly associated with an increased risk of death from all causes, which justifies further investigation. Your results appear in the Journal of the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics.

Eating out is a popular activity. The United States Department of Agriculture recently estimated that Americans’ daily energy intake from food away from home increased from 17% in 1977-1978 to 34% in 2011-2012. At the same time, the number of restaurants has grown steadily and sales in the restaurant sector are expected to increase significantly.

Although some restaurants provide high-quality food, the quality of the diet of meals away from home, especially from fast-food chains, is generally lower compared to meals prepared at home. Evidence shows that meals away from home tend to be denser in energy density, fat and sodium, but lower in fruits, vegetables, whole grains and protective nutrients such as dietary fibers and antioxidants.

“The emerging evidence, while still limited, suggests that eating out often is associated with an increased risk of chronic illnesses, such as obesity and diabetes and biomarkers of other chronic illnesses,” explained lead researcher Wei Bao, MD, Ph. D., assistant professor, Department of Epidemiology, Faculty of Public Health, University of Iowa, Iowa City, IA, USA. “However, little is known about the association between eating meals outside the home and the risk of mortality.

The investigators analyzed data from responses to questionnaires administered during home face-to-face interviews with 35,084 adults aged 20 and over who participated in the National Health and Nutritional Examination Survey 1999-2014. Respondents reported their eating habits, including the frequency of meals prepared outside the home. “We linked these records to death records until December 31, 2015, looking especially at all-cause mortality, cardiovascular mortality and cancer mortality,” noted first author Yang Du, MD, candidate Ph.D., Department of Epidemiology , Faculty of Public Health, University of Iowa, Iowa City, IA, USA.

During the follow-up of 291,475 person-years, 2,781 deaths occurred, including 511 deaths from cardiovascular disease and 638 deaths from cancer. After adjusting for age, sex, race / ethnicity, socioeconomic status, dietary and lifestyle factors and body mass index, the mortality risk rate among participants who ate meals prepared outside the home very often (two meals or more per day) compared to those who rarely ate meals prepared outside the home (less than one meal per week) was 1.49 (95% CI 1.05 to 2.13) for all causes of mortality , 1.18 (95% CI 0.55 to 2.55) for cardiovascular mortality and 1.67 (95% CI 0.87 to 3.21) for cancer mortality.

“Our findings from this large nationally representative sample of North American adults show that frequent consumption of meals prepared outside the home is significantly associated with an increased risk of all-cause mortality,” commented Dr. Du.

“This is one of the first studies to quantify the association between eating out and mortality,” concluded Dr. Bao. “Our findings, in line with previous studies, support that eating outside the home is often associated with adverse health consequences and may inform future dietary guidelines to recommend reducing consumption of meals prepared outside the home.”

“The message to take home is that frequent consumption of meals prepared outside the home may not be a healthy habit. Instead, people should be encouraged to think about preparing more meals at home, ”concluded the researchers.

Future studies are still needed to examine more closely the association of eating out with death from cardiovascular disease, cancer, dementia and other chronic diseases.

“It is important to note that the study design for this research examines associations between the frequency of eating meals prepared outside the home and mortality. While encouraging customers to consider preparing healthy meals at home, registered nutritionists may also focus on how healthy restaurant menu selections can be. Adapting strategies for each customer by analyzing the menus of the restaurants they frequent can help them make healthy food choices, “added co-investigator Linda G. Snetselaar, Ph. D., RDN, LD, FAND, professor and chair, Preventive Nutrition Education, Department of Epidemiology, Faculty of Public Health, University of Iowa, Iowa City, IA, USA, and Editor-in-Chief of Journal of the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics.