Personalised nutrition interventions for adults with elevated cardiovascular disease risk factors: results from a meta-analysis of randomised controlled trials

Cardiovascular diseases (CVDs) are the leading cause of death worldwide (1) . As poor diet quality is a major contributor to CVD burden; dietary intervention is recommended as a first-line approach to CVD prevention and management (2) . Personalised nutrition (PN) refers to individualised nutrition care based on genetic, phenotypic, medical, and/or behavioural and lifestyle characteristics (3) . Medical nutrition therapy by dietitians shares many of these principles and can be categorised as PN (4) . PN may be beneficial in improving CVD risk factors and diet, however, this has not previously been systematically reviewed. The aim of this systematic review was to evaluate the effectiveness of PN interventions on CVD risk factors and diet in adults at elevated CVD risk. A comprehensive search was conducted in March 2023 across Embase, Medline, CINAHL, PubMed, Scopus and Cochrane databases, focusing on randomised controlled trials (RCTs) published after 2000 in English. Included studies tested the effect of PN interventions on adults with elevated CVD risk factors (determined by anthropometric measures, clinical indicators, or high overall CVD risk). Risk of bias was assessed using the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics Quality Criteria checklist. Random-effects meta-analysis were conducted to explore weighted mean differences (WMD) in change or final mean values for studies with comparable data (studies with dietary counselling interventions), for outcomes including blood pressure (BP), blood lipids, and anthropometric measurements. Sixteen articles reporting on 15 unique studies (n = 7676) met inclusion criteria and were extracted. Outcomes of participants (n = 40–564) with CVD risk factors including hyperlipidaemia (n = 5), high blood pressure (n = 3), BMI > 25kg/m 2 (n = 1) or multiple factors (n = 7) were reported. Results found potential benefits of PN on systolic blood pressure (SBP) (WMD −1.91 [95% CI −3.51, −0.31] mmHg), diastolic blood pressure (DBP) (WMD −1.49 [95% CI −2.39, −0.58] mmHg), triglycerides (TG) (WMD −0.18 [95% CI −0.34, −0.03] mmol/L), and dietary intake in individuals at high CVD risk. Results were inconsistent for plasma lipid and anthropometric outcomes. Dietary counselling PN interventions showed promising results on CVD risk factors in individuals at-risk individuals. Further evidence for other personalisation methods and improvements to methodological quality and longer study durations are required in future PN interventions.