Journal Article

Higher adherence to the EAT-Lancet reference diet is inversely associated with mortality in a UK population of cancer survivors

Thompson, Alysha S., Suter, Flurina, Papier, Keren, Karavasiloglou, Nena, Cassidy, Aedín, Rohrmann, Sabine, Kühn, Tilman, Pestoni, Giulia

2025

Overview

Background Significant advancements in treatment and care, as well as early detection, have contributed to an increase in cancer survival rates. Recently, the EAT-Lancet Commission on Food, Planet, Health proposed the “planetary health diet” but to date, no study has investigated the potential associations between adherence to the EAT-Lancet reference diet and mortality in cancer survivors. To determine whether higher adherence to the EAT-Lancet reference diet is associated with lower risk for all-cause, cancer, and cardiovascular mortality in cancer survivors. Methods Data from the prospective UK Biobank study were used. Information from UK Biobank’s Touchscreen questionnaire was used to develop a score reflecting adherence to the EAT-Lancet reference diet. Cox proportional hazards regression was used to assess the association of the EAT-Lancet reference diet score with all-cause, cancer, and cardiovascular mortality in cancer survivors. Results Within 25,348 cancer survivors, better adherence to the EAT-Lancet reference diet was inversely related to all-cause mortality (hazard ratio (HR): 0.97, 95% confidence interval (CI): 0.95–0.99), 1 unit increase) and cancer mortality (HR: 0.98, 95% CI: 0.96–1.00), while mostly null associations were observed for major cardiovascular mortality (HR: 0.99, 95% CI: 0.95–1.03). Conclusions Our findings suggest the adoption of the EAT-Lancet reference diet is associated with lower all-cause and cancer-specific mortality among cancer survivors.

• Publisher: BioMed Central,BioMed Central Ltd,Springer Nature B.V,BMC
• Subject: Adult / Aged / Alcohol / Analysis / Biobanks / Biomedicine / Body mass index / Cancer / Cancer survivors / Cancer Survivors - statistics & numerical data / Cardiovascular diseases / Cardiovascular Diseases - mortality / Colorectal cancer / Confidence intervals / Diet / Diet, Healthy / Dietary guidelines / EAT-Lancet / Education / Exercise / Female / Females / Food / Food and nutrition / Food environments and health / Food habits / Forecasts and trends / Hazard assessment / Health aspects / Humans / Interactive computer systems / Lifestyles / Male / Medical diagnosis / Medical prognosis / Medicine / Medicine & Public Health / Middle Aged / Mortality / Neoplasms - mortality / Patient compliance / Patient outcomes / Prevention / Prospective Studies / Prostate / Statistical analysis / Survival / Survivors / Sustainable / Touch screens / United Kingdom / United Kingdom - epidemiology