A study published in Nutrition, Metabolism and Cardiovascular Diseases suggest that a high processed foods (PF) consumption is associated with greater blood pressure (BP) variability and extreme dipping, while the consumption of unprocessed, minimally processed foods, and culinary ingredients (U/MPF&CI) and ultra-processed foods (UPF) is negatively associated with alterations in nocturnal dipping.
Ambulatory blood pressure monitoring (ABPM), a method of measuring BP over a 24-hour period, allowing for a more comprehensive assessment of cardiovascular risk markers than casual BP measurements. In a cross-sectional study by the team of Jéssica Benatti Ribeiro included 815 participants from the ELSA-Brasil cohort, the authors aimed to evaluate the association between food consumption by degree of processing and ambulatory BP.
The authors classified food consumption according to NOVA, a system that categorizes foods according to the extent and purpose of processing.
They found that consumption of unprocessed, minimally processed foods, and culinary ingredients (U/MPF&CI) made up the majority of participants' daily caloric intake (63.1%), followed by 10.8% processed foods (PF) and 24.8% ultra-processed foods (UPF).
They found a negative association between U/MPF&CI consumption and extreme dipping (when blood pressure drops significantly during sleep) and between UPF consumption and non-dipping (when blood pressure does not drop during sleep) and extreme dipping.
On the other hand, PF consumption was positively associated with extreme dipping and sleep SBP variability.
These results provide important insight into how different types of food may affect blood pressure, and suggest that minimizing consumption of processed foods and increasing intake of unprocessed, minimally processed foods, and culinary ingredients may have a beneficial impact on blood pressure.
Source:
Ribeiro., J. B., Miranda Hermsdorff., H. H., de Jesus Mendes da Fonseca., M., Molina., M. del C. B., Griep., R. H., & Juvanhol, L. L. (2023). Food consumption by degree of processing is associated with nocturnal dipping and blood pressure variability: the ELSA-Brasil study. In Nutrition, Metabolism and Cardiovascular Diseases. Elsevier BV. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.numecd.2023.02.007