Intakes of 4 dietary lignans and cause-specific and all-cause mortality in the Zutphen Elderly Study

BACKGROUND: Plant lignans are converted to enterolignans that have antioxidant and weak estrogen-like activities, and therefore they may lower cardiovascular disease and cancer risks. OBJECTIVE: We investigated whether the intakes of 4 plant lignans (lariciresinol, pinoresinol, secoisolariciresinol, and matairesinol) were inversely associated with coronary heart disease (CHD), cardiovascular diseases (CVD), cancer, and all-cause mortality. DESIGN: The Zutphen Elderly Study is a prospective cohort study in which 570 men aged 64-84 y were followed for 15 y. We recently developed a database and used it to estimate the dietary intakes of 4 plant lignans. Lignan intake was related to mortality with the use of Cox proportional hazards analysis. RESULTS: The median total lignan intake in 1985 was 977 μg/d. Tea, vegetables, bread, coffee, fruit, and wine were the major sources of lignan. The total lignan intake was not related to mortality. However, the intake of matairesinol was inversely associated with CHD, CVD, and all-cause mortality (P