PUT the kettle on and have another cuppa - and grab some fruit and vegies while you're at it.
That's the message from US researchers who have found elderly people with diets rich in flavonols - a group of antioxidants found in fruits, vegetables, and tea - may be less likely to develop Alzheimer's disease.
Authors of the study, published in the American Academy of Neurology journal, said while more research was needed to confirm the results the findings were "postive".
"Eating more fruits and vegetables and drinking more tea could be a fairly inexpensive and easy way for people to help stave off Alzheimer's dementia," said lead study Dr Thomas M. Holland, of Rush University in Chicago.
"With the elderly population increasing worldwide, any decrease in the number of people with this devastating disease, or even delaying it for a few years, could have an enormous benefit on public health."
For an average of six years, researchers tracked what more than 900 elderly people - with an average age of 81 - ate and drank and monitored who went on to develop Alzheimer's.
People who had the most flavonols (a group of phytochemicals found in plant pigments known for their beneficial effects on health) in their diet were about half as likely to develop Alzheimer's than those who consumed the least.
Participants were asked to fill in questionnaires about how often they ate certain foods. They then worked out a tally for each person's total average consumption of four flavonols.
These were kempferol (found in kale, beans, tea, spinach and broccoli), quercetin (tomatoes, kale, apples and tea), myricetin (also in tea, as well as wine, kale, oranges and tomatoes) and isorhamnetin (pears, olive oil, wine and tomato sauce).
The people were divided into five groups based on how much flavonol they had in their diet. The average amount of flavonol intake in US adults is about 16 to 20 milligrams per day. The lowest group had intake of about 5.3 mg per day and the highest group consumed an average of 15.3 mg per day.
The study found people in the highest group were 48 per cent less likely to later develop Alzheimer's dementia than the people in the lowest group after adjusting for genetic predisposition and demographic and lifestyle factors. Of the 186 people in the highest group, 28 people, or 15 per cent, developed Alzheimer's dementia, compared to 54 people, or 30 per cent, of the 182 people in the lowest group.
The results were the same after researchers adjusted for other factors that could affect the risk of Alzheimer's dementia, such as, diabetes, previous heart attack, stroke and high blood pressure.
People who had high intake of isorhamnetin were 38 per cent less likely to develop Alzheimer's. Those with high intake of kaempferol were 51 per cent less likely to develop dementia. And those with high intake of myricetin were also 38 per cent less likely to develop dementia. Quercetin was not tied to a lower risk of Alzheimer's dementia.
Holland noted that the study shows an association between dietary flavonols and Alzheimer's risk but does not prove that flavonols directly cause a reduction in disease risk.
He said other limitations of the study were that the food frequency questionnaire, although valid, was self-reported, so people may not accurately remember what they eat, and the majority of participants were white people, so the results may not reflect the general population.
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