Relationship to Blood Pressure of Combinations of Dietary Macronutrients Findings of the Multiple Risk Factor Intervention Trial (MRFIT)

Background Elevated blood pressure remains a widespread major impediment to health. Obesity and specific dietary factors such as high salt and alcohol intake and low potassium intake adversely affect blood pressure. It is a reasonable hypothesis that additional dietary constituents, particularly macronutrients, may also influence blood pressure. Methods and Results Participants were 11 342 middle-aged men from the Multiple Risk Factor Intervention Trial (MRFIT). Data from repeat 24-hour dietary recalls (four to five per person) and blood pressure measurements at six annual visits were used to assess relationships, singly and in combination, of dietary macronutrients to blood pressure, adjusted for multiple possible confounders (demographic, dietary, and biomedical). Multiple linear regression was used to assess diet–blood pressure relations in two MRFIT treatment groups (special intervention and usual care), with adjustment for confounders, pooling of coefficients from the two groups (weighted by inverse ...