Dietary intake of men aged 50-70 is associated with a 20 year, all cause mortality in different cultures. The healthy diet indicator is useful in evaluating the relation of mortality to dietary patterns.

Objective: To relate dietary patterns to cognitive function in elderly men. Design: Cross-sectional study. Setting: Population based. Subjects: 1049 men aged 70 ± 91 years around 1990 in ®ve cohorts from the Seven Countries Study: Finland (2 cohorts), the Netherlands (1 cohort), and Italy (2 cohorts). Interventions: Food intake was estimated by a cross-check dietary history. Based on the WHO guidelines for the prevention of chronic diseases, a healthy diet indicator was calculated (HDI). A higher HDI indicates a diet more in accordance with the WHO guidelines, and previously we showed that HDI predicted reduced all-cause mortality in our cohorts. Cognitive function was measured using the Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE), and a score of 23 or lower was used to indicate cognitive impairment. Results: The prevalence of cognitive impairment varied from 14.4% in Zutphen (The Netherlands) to 42.1% in Crevalcore (Italy). There was a tendency towards a lower prevalence of cognitive impairment associated with increased HDI in four out of ®ve cohorts (not in East Finland). In Zutphen this association was borderline signi®cant (OR 0.81; 95% CI 0.63 ± 1.04) after adjustment for age, education, cigarette smoking, alcohol consumption and energy intake. In Crevalcore the association was statistically signi®cant (OR 0.75; 95% CI 0.58 ± 0.97). Conclusions: A healthy diet might be associated with a better cognitive function in elderly men. However, since the results were not consistent over all ®ve cohorts, further research is needed to con®rm this ®nding and to decide whether this association is causal.

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