Sugar-sweetened beverages, artificially sweetened beverages and natural juices and risk of inflammatory bowel disease: a cohort study of 121,490 participants

Abstract

Background: Inflammatory bowel diseases (IBD) have been related to high-sugar dietary patterns, but the associations of different types of beverages with IBD risk are largely unknown.

Aims: To examine any associations between intake of sugar-sweetened beverages, artificially sweetened beverages and natural juices and IBD risk METHODS: This cohort study included 121,490 participants in the UK Biobank who were free of IBD at recruitment. Intake of beverages was obtained from repeated 24-h diet recalls in 2009-2012. Cox proportional hazard models were used to estimate the hazard ratios (HRs) and 95% confidence intervals (CIs) for associations of beverage intake with IBD risk.

Results: During a mean (standard deviation) follow-up of 10.2 (1.5) years, we documented 510 incident IBD cases, (143 Crohn's disease (CD) and 367 ulcerative colitis (UC)). Compared to non-consumers, participants consuming >1 unit per day of sugar-sweetened beverages were at significantly higher risk of IBD (HR 1.51, 95% CI 1.11-2.05), but the trend was non-significant (p-trend = 0.170). This association was significant for CD (HR 2.05, 95% CI 1.22-3.46), but not for UC (HR 1.31, 95% CI 0.89-1.92). We did not observe significant associations for the consumption of artificially sweetened beverages or natural juices.

Conclusions: Our findings suggest an association between consumption of sugar-sweetened beverages, rather than artificially sweetened beverages or natural juices, and IBD risk.

FIGURE 1

Participant inclusion. AHEI, alternative healthy eating index; CD, Crohn's disease; IBD, inflammatory bowel disease; UC, ulcerative colitis.

FIGURE 2

Cumulative incidence of inflammatory bowel disease, Crohn's disease and ulcerative colitis according to consumptions of sugar‐sweetened beverages, artificially sweetened beverages and natural juices unit/day.

FIGURE 3

Associations between beverage intake and risk of inflammatory bowel disease, Crohn's disease and ulcerative colitis.

FIGURE 4

Associations between total sugar intake and risk of inflammatory bowel disease, Crohn's disease and ulcerative colitis. HRs were calculated by Cox proportional hazard regression models adjusted for age, gender, ethnicity, education, Townsend deprivation index, physical activities, smoking status, alcohol drinking status, BMI and total energy, alternative healthy eating index and beverages. CI, confidence interval; BMI, body mass index; HR, hazard ratio.