Association of Walnut Consumption with Total and Cause-Specific Mortality and Life Expectancy in US Adults

Walnut consumption is associated with health benefits. We aimed to (1) examine the association between walnut consumption and mortality and (2) estimate life expectancy in relation to walnut consumption in U.S. adults. We included 67,014 women of the Nurses' Health Study (1998-2018) and 26,326 men of the Health Professionals Follow-up Study (1998-2018) who were free of cancer, heart disease, and stroke at baseline. We used Cox regression models to estimate hazard ratios (HRs) and 95% confidence intervals (CIs). During up to 20 years of follow-up, we documented 30,263 deaths. The hazard ratios for total mortality across categories of walnut intake (servings/week), as compared to non-consumers, were 0.95 (95% confidence interval (CI), 0.91, 0.98) for <1 serving/week, 0.94 (95% CI, 0.89, 0.99) for 1 serving/week, 0.87 (95% CI, 0.82, 0.93) for 2-4 servings/week, and 0.86 (95% CI, 0.79, 0.93) for >=5 servings/week (p for trend <0.0001). A greater life expectancy at age 60 (1.30 years in women and 1.26 years in men) was observed among those who consumed walnuts more than 5 servings/week compared to non-consumers. Higher walnut consumption was associated with a lower risk of total and CVD mortality and a greater gained life expectancy among U.S. elder adults.

Automated summary

Consumption of walnuts is associated with improved life expectancy and reduced mortality risk, with those consuming more than 5 servings per week experiencing greater benefits.