Dietary Added Sugar Intake and Risk for Depression in Individuals Receiving Interventions to Improve Health Literacy

Nova Southeastern University, Davie, Florida, USA

Objective: The study was conducted to determine the relationship between added-sugar consumption and risk for depression in individuals with low baseline levels of health literacy participating in the FLIGHT/VIDAS II clinical trial. Background: Health literacy is critical to understanding one’s general health, chronic disease management, and influencing lifestyle preferences. It is demonstrated in the literature that there is a relationship between dietary quality and health literacy, but this relationship has not been well explored. Furthermore, recent studies have begun to evaluate the association between depression and diet, specifically the intake of dietary added sugars (DAS) and added sugar from sugar sweetened beverages (SSB). Methods: Results from the NHANES Dietary Screener Questionnaire for 165 participants were collected at baseline. Algorithms defined by the National Cancer Institute were used to calculate DAS and SSB in daily teaspoons of added sugar. A multivariate analysis was conducted using Center for Epidemiologic Studies Depression Scale (CES-D) scores above threshold (>16), Gender (Male/Female), and DAS and SSB as dependent variables. Level of health literacy was accounted for as a covariate. Results: There were statistically significant interactions between CES-D scores above threshold and gender on the combined dependent variables DAS and SSB where F(6,318), p Conclusion: Preliminary evidence from baseline assessments demonstrates a relationship between intake of DAS and SSB and risk the for depression, in individuals identified with having a low baseline level of health literacy. Further studies may consider the effects of interventions aimed at improving health literacy on dietary quality and the intake of DAS and SSB. Grants: This study was supported by grants R01HL096578, R56HL096578 and R01MD010368 (Ownby, PI) from the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute and the National Institute on Minority Health and Health Disparities