Study: Diverticulitis Associated with Red Meat Consumption

A new study found that the consumption of unprocessed red meat increased the risk for diverticulitis in men.

Researchers studied the quantity of total red meat, red unprocessed meat, red processed meat, poultry, and fish in 46,461 men from the Health Professionals Follow-up Study, and used Cox proportional hazards models to calculate the risk for developing diverticulitis.

A total of 764 cases of diverticulitis was documented during the follow-up. Men who consumed the most total red meat had a hazard ratio of 1.58 compared with men who consumed the least amount of red meat. In addition, unprocessed red meat was associated with a higher risk for diverticulitis incidences than processed red meat. Researchers noted that the increased risks were not linear, and plateaued at 6 servings per week.

Conversely, high consumption of poultry or fish was not associated with an increased risk for diverticulitis, and the substitution of poultry or fish for unprocessed red meat reduced the risk of developing diverticulitis.

Their findings indicated that the consumption of unprocessed red meat, and red meat in general, increased the risk for developing diverticulitis in men.

—Melissa Weiss

Reference:

Cao Y, Strate LL, Keeley BR, et al. Meat intake and risk of diverticulitis among men [published online January 9, 2017]. Gut. doi:10.1136/gutjnl-2016-313082.