Association between the frequency of fruit and vegetable consumption and cardiovascular disease in male smokers and non-smokers.

BACKGROUND/OBJECTIVES: Consumption of fruit and vegetables (F&V) is associated with a lower cardiovascular disease (CVD) risk. Smoking may affect the strength of this association. The objective of this study was to compare the relationship between the frequency of F&V intake and CVD risk in male current, former and never smokers.

SUBJECTS/METHODS: A prospective study in men (n=8060) aged 50-59 years who were recruited in France and Northern Ireland. The frequency of F&V intake was assessed by using a food frequency questionnaire. The outcome criteria were incident cases of acute coronary syndrome (ACS) and total CVD (coronary heart disease and stroke) over 10-year period.

RESULTS: A total of 367 ACS and 612 CVD events occurred during the follow-up period. A multivariate analysis revealed a statistically significant interaction between smoking status and F&V intake for ACS and for CVD (both P's<0.05). In current smokers, the relative risks for ACS were 0.78 (0.54-1.13) and 0.49 (0.30-0.81) in the second and third tertiles of F&V intake, respectively (P for trend<0.001); for CVD, the values were 0.80 (0.59-1.08) and 0.64 (0.44-0.93) respectively (P for trend<0.001). In contrast, no statistically significant associations were observed for never and former smokers. Similar statistical interactions for ACS were observed for fruit intake (P=0.07) and vegetable intake (P<0.05) taken separately.

CONCLUSIONS: These results suggest that high fruit and vegetable intake is associated with a lower risk of CVD in male smokers.