The Dietary Inflammatory Index Is Associated With Diabetes Severity

Article Figures & Data

Table 1.

Population Characteristics by Diabetes Status in NHANES 2013 to 2014 (N = 4434)

Characteristic	Overall^*	No Diabetes (n = 3810), % (95% CI)	Diabetes (n = 624), % (95% CI)	P-Value^†
Age (years)
20 to 44	1862	96.4 (95.2 to 97.5)	3.6 (2.5 to 4.8)	<.0001
45 to 64	1562	86.0 (83.3 to 88.8)	14.0 (11.2 to 16.70
65+	1010	78.8 (76.6 to 81.0)	21.2 (19.0 to 23.4)
Sex, %
Male	2060	88.4 (86.8 to 89.9)	11.6 (10.1 to 13.2)	.08
Female	2374	89.9 (88.6 to 91.3)	10.1 (8.7 to 11.4)
Race
Non-Hispanic white	1988	90.0 (88.7 to 91.1)	10.0 (8.8 to 11.3)	.0005
Non-Hispanic Black	884	85.0 (82.5 to 87.4)	15.0 (12.6 to 17.5)
Hispanic	979	89.2 (86.7 to 91.7)	10.8 (8.3 to 13.3)
Other	583	88.4 (85.7 to 91.0)	11.6 (9.0 to 14.3)
Education
≥High school	3524	90.1 (88.8 to 91.4)	9.9 (8.6 to 11.2)	<.0001
<High school	847	83.6 (81.3 to 86.0)	16.4 (14.0 to 18.7)
Health insurance
Yes	3533	88.3 (87.0 to 89.6)	11.7 (10.4 to 13.0)	.0006
No	896	93.4 (91.2 to 95.6)	6.6 (4.4 to 8.8)
Physical activity
≥150 Minutes/week	1400	93.2 (91.3 to 95.2)	6.7 (4.8 to 8.7)	<.0001
<150 Minutes/week	3034	87.0 (86.0 to 88.0)	13.0 (11.9 to 14.0)
Body mass index
Underweight (<18.5 kg/m²)	68	97.9 (94.7 to 100)	2.1 (0.0 to 5.3)	<.0001
Normal (18.5 to 24.9 kg/m²)	1208	96.4 (95.3 to 97.5)	3.6 (2.5 to 4.7)
Overweight (25 to 29.9 kg/m²)	1418	92.3 (91.0 to 93.6)	7.7 (6.4 to 9.0)
Obese (≥30 kg/m²)	1707	81.3 (79.3 to 83.3)	18.7 (16.7 to 20.7)
Smoking
Yes	833	91.9 (89.7 to 91.2)	8.1 (5.9 to 10.3)	.03
No	3600	88.6 (87.2 to 90.0)	11.4 (10.0 to 12.8)
Alcohol use
Yes	3081	90.5 (89.6 to 91.4)	9.5 (8.6 to 10.4)	<.0001
No	1174	83.9 (80.5 to 87.4)	16.1 (12.6 to 19.5)

NHANES, National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey; CI, confidence interval.
↵* Unequal sample sizes due to missing values from subjects.
↵† P-value for comparison of difference in proportion between diabetic and non-diabetic subjects, using χ² test.

Table 2.

Means (Least Square) of Dietary Inflammatory Index (DII) Scores by Diabetes Status and Severity of Diabetes

Diabetes Status	LS Mean	Std Error	P-Value
No diabetes (n = 2634)	0.50⁸	0.05	.03^‡
Pre-diabetes (n = 1176)	0.50^†	0.06
Diabetes (n = 624)	0.79^*^†	0.10
Severity of Diabetes
Mild (HgbA1c 6.5% to 9%) (n = 375)	0.55	0.11	.0002^§
Severe (HgbA1c > 9%) (n = 94)	1.37	0.14

The range of the DII scores was −3.41 to 9.05. Positive scores are pro-inflammatory and negative scores are anti-inflammatory.
↵* P < .05 for comparison of difference between non-diabetic and diabetic subjects.
↵† P < .05 for comparison of difference between pre-diabetic and diabetic subjects.
↵‡ P-value for comparison of mean difference in DII scores between non-diabetic, pre-diabetic, and diabetic subjects using regression analysis.
↵§ P-value for comparison of difference in DII scores between subjects with different level s of severity of diabetes using regression analysis.