# Healthy dietary intake diminishes the effect of cerebral small vessel disease on cognitive performance in older adults

## TL;DR

Eating a healthy diet may help protect older adults' cognitive function from the effects of brain vessel disease.

## Contribution

This study shows that healthy dietary intake can moderate the impact of cerebral small vessel disease on cognition.

## Key findings

- Healthy dietary intake reduced the negative effect of cSVD biomarkers on cognitive scores.
- Moderation was observed for biomarkers like white matter lesions and microbleeds.
- The protective effect was strongest at medium and high dietary intake levels.

## Abstract

We evaluated whether regular dietary intake of nutrients commonly found in fish, unsaturated oils, and nuts would moderate the associations between neuroimaging biomarkers of cerebral small vessel disease (cSVD) and cognitive function in older adults.

Dietary information, Montreal Cognitive Assessment (MoCA) scores, and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scans were collected from 71 older adults without dementia (60–86 years). MRI biomarkers of cSVD were calculated for each participant. Multivariate linear regression models were computed using dietary intake as the moderating variable. Covariates included age, sex, and estimated intracranial volume.

Dietary intake moderated the association between several cSVD biomarkers and MoCA scores such that the expected negative association between cSVD biomarkers and cognition was seen at low levels of healthy dietary intake, but not at medium or high levels. A dietary intake by age moderation was not observed.

Our findings indicate that healthy dietary intake may confer cognitive reserve against cSVD in older adults.