Excess of weight and ingestion of low diet quality in patients with pulmonary hypertension: a different profile of lung disease patient

Abstract

Background: Pulmonary hypertension (PH) is characterized by elevated blood pressure in the pulmonary artery. The literature is still scarce about nutritional approaches to this disease. However, is well known that high diet quality has a beneficial impact on quality of life, progression, and mortality of patients with chronic lung diseases, and this may apply to PH as well. Aims: To evaluate diet quality in patients with PH and characterize their comorbidities. Materials and Methods: Cross-sectional study with 35 patients. Body mass index, body fat, food intake, blood biochemical parameters were assessed. Diet quality was evaluated with the Healthy Eating Index (HEI) instrument. Results: The sample consisted predominantly of women (77.2%); 57.1% of the subjects were overweight or obese. Systemic arterial hypertension was the most prevalent comorbidity (28.6%), and one-third of the sample had glycemic changes and hypertriglyceridemia. Most subjects (82.9%) had low diet quality, and none had diet quality classified as good. Intake of fiber, calcium, and monounsaturated fatty acids was below current recommendations, while intake of protein and saturated fatty acids exceeded recommendations (p<0.05). Discussion and Conclusion: This sample of patients with PH was predominantly overweight/obese and had poor diet quality. The presence of chronic non-communicable diseases, altered glucose levels, and hyperlipidemia is consistent with these findings, possibly because of poor diet quality.

Keywords

• healthy diet
• pulmonary hypertension
• lung diseases
• nutrition assessment