To examine associations between the prevalence of degenerative arthritis and soft tissue disorders and consumption of meat and other foods among participants in the Adventist Health Study.
Unconditional logistic regression analysis is used to examine cross-sectional associations, adjusting for the effects of age, smoking, alcohol consumption, body mass index, use of sex hormones and parity.
The prevalence of degenerative arthritis and soft tissue disorders was 22.60 percent. Women had a higher prevalence than men and prevalence increased greatly with age. Smoking, higher body mass index, never use of contraceptive pills, and current hormone replacement therapy are associated with a higher prevalence of these disorders on multivariate analysis. Multivariate OR's comparing consumption of meat < 1/week; >or= 1/week; with the reference being no meat, were 1.31(95% CI: 1.21,1.43) and 1.49(1.31, 1.70) in women; and 1.19 (95% CI: 1.05,1.34) and 1.43(1.20, 1.70) in men. Dairy fat and fruit consumption were weakly associated with increased risk. There were protective associations with nut and salad consumption.
Greater meat consumption is associated with a higher prevalence of degenerative arthritis and soft tissue disorders in both male and female subjects of this population, as is hormone replacement therapy in women.