Association between Nonfood Pre- or Probiotic Use and Cognitive Function: Results from NHANES 2011-2014

• Published in: Nutrients Vol. 15; no. 15; p. 3408
• Main Authors: Chen, Jingyi, Yang, Nian, Peng, Yilei, Zhou, Honghao, Li, Qing
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Switzerland MDPI AG 31-07-2023; MDPI
• Subjects: Age; Aged; Body mass index; Cognition; Cognition & reasoning; Cognitive ability; Cognitive Dysfunction; cognitive function; Dietary supplements; Ethnicity; Gender; Humans; Hypertension; Investigations; Male; Microbiota; NHANES; Nutrition Surveys; Older people; Physiology; Population; prebiotic; Prebiotics; probiotic; Probiotics; Random variables; Regression analysis; Software; Stroke; Surveys; United States - epidemiology; United States; United States > US; cognitive function; probiotic; NHANES; prebiotic
• ISSN: 2072-6643; 2072-6643
• DOI: 10.3390/nu15153408

In this study, we collected data from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) for the years 2011-2014. Multiple linear regression and logistic regression were used to analyse the association between nonfood pro- or prebiotic use and cognitive function among elderly Americans. To estimate the potential unobserved results, propensity score matching (PSM) was used to analyse the causal effect. Nonfood pro- or prebiotic use was analysed through the Dietary Supplement Use 30-Day Study. Cognitive function was evaluated by the Digit Symbol Substitution Test (DSST), the Animal Fluency Test (AFT), the Consortium to Establish a Registry for Alzheimer's Disease (CERAD), and a composite Z-score calculated by summing the Z-scores of three tests. Male participants who used nonfood pro- or prebiotics tended to have higher comprehensive cognitive function (sum.z) with a β-coefficient of 0.64 (95% CI: 0.08-1.19). Probiotics or prebiotics may be a protective factor against cognitive impairment in males, with an odds ratio of 0.08 (95% CI: 0.02-0.29). Furthermore, the average treatment effect for the treated (ATT) with nonfood pro- or prebiotics (0.555) on sum.z in males was statistically significant (
< 0.05). Our research revealed that nonfood pre- or probiotic use was an effective method to improve cognitive function in elderly men from the USA.