Stress, Dietary Patterns and Cardiovascular Disease: A Mini-Review

Abstract

According to the World Health Organization, an unhealthy diet and insufficient physical activity are the leading global risks to health. Dietary behavior is a modifiable factor in cardiovascular disease (CVD) prevention. Furthermore, the fact that cardiovascular events and stress-related emotional disorders share a common epidemiology may indicate the existence of pathways linking these two diseases (Chauvet-Gelinier and Bonin, 2017). Psychosocial stress can lead to changes in dietary patterns (DP) and under chronic stress conditions, high caloric and hyperpalatable foods are preferred. The interplay between these two factors impacts on several biological pathways: for example, it can prime the hippocampus to produce a potentiated neuroinflammatory response, generating memory deficits; it can also affect gut microbiota composition, ultimately influencing behavior and brain health and creating a predisposition to the development of diseases such as obesity, CVD, diabetes and metabolic syndrome. Though both cognition and emotion can be heavily affected by caloric intake, diet composition and stress, the molecular pathways involved remain elusive (Spencer et al., 2017). In this review, we describe the interplay between stress and DP at a molecular level, and how these factors relate to brain health and mental fitness. Finally, we show how these findings could give rise to novel therapeutic targets for chronic diseases.