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Topical Area: Nutritional Epidemiology

Nutritional Epidemiology (I) (Poster Session)

(P19-047-23) Lignan Intake and Type 2 Diabetes Incidence: Evidence From Prospective Cohorts of US Men and Women

Sunday, July 23, 2023
11:45 AM – 12:45 PM ET
Location: Poster Board 144

    Presenting Author(s)

  • SW

    Siyue Wang (she/her/hers)

    n/a
    Harvard University
    Boston, Massachusetts, United States

    • Co-Author(s)

  • YH

    Yang Hu, ScD

    Research associate
    Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health

  • Binkai Liu, MS (she/her/hers)

    Research Assistant
    Harvard University
    Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States

  • YL

    Yanping Li, PhD

    Research Scientist
    Harvard University
    Boston, Massachusetts, United States

  • MW

    Molin Wang, PhD

    Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health
    Boston, Massachusetts, United States

  • QS

    Qi Sun, PhD

    Associate Professor
    Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health
    Boston, Massachusetts, United States

Disclosure(s):
Siyue Wang: No relevant financial relationship(s) with ineligible companies to disclose.
Binkai Liu, MS: No relevant financial relationship(s) with ineligible companies to disclose.


Objectives: Lignans have been suggested to play a potentially beneficial role in lowering type 2 diabetes (T2D) risk, although human data are sparse. This study aimed to prospectively investigate associations between lignan intake and T2D incidence in US men and women.

Methods: This study followed 208,882 participants in the Health Professionals Follow-up Study (HPFS), Nurses' Health Study (NHS), and NHSII who did not have T2D, cardiovascular disease, or cancer at baseline in 1986, 1984 and 1991, respectively. Lignan intake was assessed repeatedly using a validated food frequency questionnaire every 2-4 years since baseline. Cox proportional hazards models were used to estimate hazard ratios (HRs) and 95% confidence intervals (CIs) for T2D incidence in relation to intakes of total and individual lignans including secoisolariciresinol, lariciresinol, pinoresinol and matairesinol.

Results: During 5,411,120 person-years of follow-up, 20,064 T2D cases were documented. Higher total lignan intake was significantly associated with lower T2D risk (pooled HR comparing extreme quintiles: 0.92, 95% CI: 0.87-0.98; P<sub> for trend = 0.0006) after multivariate adjustments of covariates. Of individual lignans, secoisolariciresinol intake showed a significant inverse association with T2D risk (pooled HR comparing extreme quintiles: 0.75, 95% CI: 0.71-0.79; P<sub> for trend = 0.0001). Other individual lignans were not significantly associated with T2D risk. The inverse associations for total lignan and secoisolariciresinol intake were partially mediated by the time-varying BMI ( proportion mediated for total lignan: 10.1%, 95%CI:4.1%-22.8%, P = 0.0072; for secoisolariciresinol: 15.0%, 95%CI: 8.2%-25.9%, P = 0.0003), and were more pronounced among participants without a family history of diabetes (P < 0.01 for both interaction).

Conclusions: This study provides evidence that long-term lignan intake, particularly secoisolariciresinol, may be beneficial in the prevention of T2D. The association between lignan intake and T2D incidence was partially mediated by the time-varying BMI.

Funding Sources: The cohorts and the current analysis are supported by NIH grants CA186107, CA87969, CA167552, HL034594, HL035464, HL60712, DK120870, DK126698, DK119268, DK129670, and ES022981.