Skip to main content
NUTRITION 2023 Main banner
Icon Legend
This session is not in your schedule.
This session is in your schedule. Click again to remove it.
Back

Topical Area: Nutritional Epidemiology

Nutritional Epidemiology (II) (Poster Session)

(P29-051-23) Egg consumption is not associated with Nonalcoholic Fatty Liver Disease risk after accounting for body weight in the Framingham Heart Study

Monday, July 24, 2023
12:45 PM – 1:45 PM ET
Location: Poster Board 176

    Presenting Author(s)

  • Ioanna Yiannakou, RD, MS, PhD candidate

    PhD candidate
    Boston University School of Medicine
    Boston, Massachusetts, United States

    • Co-Author(s)

  • ML

    Michelle T. Long, MD, MSc

    Clinical Drug Development, Medicine and Science, NASH, Novo Nordisk, Bagsværd, Denmark & Department of Medicine, Section of Gastroenterology, Boston University School of Medicine

  • MS

    Martha R. Singer, RD, MPH

    Department of Medicine/Preventive Medicine and Epidemiology, Boston University Chobanian & Avedisian School of Medicine
    Boston, Massachusetts, United States

  • XZ

    Xinyi Zhou, MS

    Research Fellow
    Department of Medicine/Preventive Medicine and Epidemiology, Boston University Chobanian & Avedisian School of Medicine
    Boston, Massachusetts, United States

  • Lynn L. Moore, DSc, MPH

    Department of Medicine/Preventive Medicine and Epidemiology, Boston University Chobanian & Avedisian School of Medicine
    Boston, Massachusetts, United States

Disclosure(s):
Ioanna Yiannakou, RD, MS, PhD candidate: No relevant financial relationship(s) with ineligible companies to disclose.
Xinyi Zhou, MS: No relevant financial relationship(s) with ineligible companies to disclose.


Objectives: Although eggs are considered unhealthy due to concerns about dietary cholesterol intake, they are rich in protein and many important bioactive nutrients, including dietary choline. Choline deficiency has been causally linked with the emerging cardiometabolic disease of nonalcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD). However, whether there is a relation between eggs and liver fat in humans is still unknown. We investigated the prospective association between egg intakes and NAFLD risk in two generational community cohorts.

Methods: Over 2,000 participants from the Framingham Heart Study second and third-generation cohorts underwent a computed tomography (CT) scan to assess liver fat at baseline and after six years (median). Incident NAFLD was defined as a liver phantom ratio ≤0.33 on the follow-up CT scan after excluding baseline NAFLD. Diet information was derived from food frequency questionnaires at baseline. Sex-specific modified Poisson regression models were used to compute NAFLD risk ratios (RR) and confidence intervals (CI) adjusting for age, energy, a measure of diet quality, alcohol intake, education, and BMI.

Results: Over ~ 6 years, 14% women and 24% men developed NAFLD. Women and men in this cohort consumed similar amounts of eggs (~1 egg per week). However, men consuming ≥2 eggs per week (vs. < 1) had higher intakes of fruits, dairy, red meat, and total sweets, while both men and women consumed more vegetables and had higher BMI at baseline. After adjusting for diet, lifestyle, and sociodemographic factors as well as BMI, women consuming ≥2 eggs per week had a non-statistically significant 21% higher risk (95% CI: 0.81-1.81), and men had a non-statistically significant 16% lower NAFLD risk (95% CI: 0.61-1.21). Further, egg intakes stratified by BMI levels were not associated with NAFLD risk. Lastly, egg consumption combined with other eating patterns (e.g., intakes of fruits, vegetables, dairy, red meat, and fiber) was also not associated with NAFLD risk.

Conclusions: In our study, higher egg intake alone or in combination with other eating patterns was not associated with risk for incident NAFLD among either women or men after accounting for body weight.

Funding Sources: American Egg Board’s Egg Nutrition Center