Objective
To assess the association between consumption of fried foods and risk of coronary heart disease.

Design
Prospective cohort study.

Setting
Spanish cohort of the European Prospective Investigation into Cancer and Nutrition.

Participants
40?757 adults aged 29-69 and free of coronary heart disease at baseline (1992-6), followed up until 2004.

Main outcome measures
Coronary heart disease events and vital status identified by record linkage with hospital discharge registers, population based registers of myocardial infarction, and mortality registers.

Results
During a median follow-up of 11 years, 606 coronary heart disease events and 1135 deaths from all causes occurred. Compared with being in the first (lowest) quarter of fried food consumption, the multivariate hazard ratio of coronary heart disease in the second quarter was 1.15 (95% confidence interval 0.91 to 1.45), in the third quarter was 1.07 (0.83 to 1.38), and in the fourth quarter was 1.08 (0.82 to 1.43; P for trend 0.74). The results did not vary between those who used olive oil for frying and those who used sunflower oil. Likewise, no association was observed between fried food consumption and all cause mortality: multivariate hazard ratio for the highest versus the lowest quarter of fried food consumption was 0.93 (95% confidence interval 0.77 to 1.14; P for trend 0.98).

Conclusion
In Spain, a Mediterranean country where olive or sunflower oil is used for frying, the consumption of fried foods was not associated with coronary heart disease or with all cause mortality.

Full article here (British Medical Journal)

Objective: To examine the relation between frequency of sexual intercourse and risk of ischaemic stroke and coronary heart disease.

Design: Cohort study with 20 year follow up.

Setting: The town of Caerphilly, South Wales and five adjacent villages.

Subjects: 914 men aged 45–59 years at time of recruitment in 1979 to 1983.

Main outcome measures: Ischaemic stroke and coronary heart disease, all first events and fatal events.

Results: Of the 914 men studied, 197 (21.5%) reported sexual intercourse less often than once a month, 231 (25.3%) reported sexual intercourse twice or more a week, and the remaining 486 (53.2%) men fell into the intermediate category. Frequency of sexual intercourse was not associated with all first ischaemic stroke events: age adjusted odds ratios (95% CI) for intermediate and low frequency of sexual intercourse of 0.61 (0.32 to 1.16) and 0.71 (0.34 to 1.49) respectively compared with the reference category of high frequency. A graded relation with fatal coronary heart disease events was observed in events recorded up to 10 years. The age adjusted relative risk (95% CI) of fatal coronary heart disease contrasting low frequency of sexual intercourse (that is, less than monthly) with the highest group (at least twice a week) was 2.80 (1.13 to 6.96, test for trend, p=0.04) which was not attenuated by adjustment for a wide range of potential confounders. Longer follow up to 20 years showed attenuation of this risk with odds of 1.69 (95% CI 0.90 to 3.20), contrasting low frequency of sexual intercourse with the highest group.

Conclusions: The differential relation between frequency of sexual intercourse, stroke and coronary heart disease suggests that confounding is an unlikely explanation for the observed association with fatal coronary heart disease events. Middle aged men should be heartened to know that frequent sexual intercourse is not likely to result in a substantial increase in risk of strokes, and that some protection from fatal coronary events may be an added bonus.

[Full text] [PDF]

S Ebrahim¹, M May¹, Y Ben Shlomo¹, P McCarron¹, S Frankel¹, J Yarnell² and G Davey Smith¹

¹ Department of Social Medicine, University of Bristol, UK
² Department of Epidemiology and Public Health, Queens University of Belfast, Northern Ireland

Correspondence to:
Professor S Ebrahim, Department of Social Medicine, University of Bristol, Canynge Hall, Whiteladies Road, Bristol BS8 2PR, UK;
shah.ebrahim@bristol.ac.uk