Association between the empirical dietary inflammatory index and musculoskeletal pain in community-dwelling older adults: a cross-sectional study

Objectives: Inflammation has been proposed to be one of the main causes of musculoskeletal pain. Diet is a lifestyle factor that plays an important role in managing inflammation; thus, we assessed the inflammatory potential of diets using the empirical dietary inflammatory index (EDII) to investigate the relationship between diet and musculoskeletal pain. Methods: This cross-sectional study included 212 elderly individuals who were selected from health centers in Tehran, Iran. Dietary intake was evaluated using a valid and reliable 147-item food frequency questionnaire. To measure the intensity of pain, a visual analogue scale was used. Multiple linear regression was applied to assess the association between the EDII and musculoskeletal pain. Results: In total, 62.7% and 37.3% of participants had mild and severe pain, respectively. The EDII values were 0.97 +/- 0.72 and 1.10 +/- 0.66, respectively, in those with mild and severe pain. A higher EDII score was associated with more intense musculoskeletal pain after adjusting for age and sex (beta=0.20; 95% confidence interval [CI], 0.06-0.26; p< 0.001), but not after adjustment for other confounders (beta=-0.13; 95% CI, -1.54 to 0.60; p=0.39). Conclusion: Our findings indicated that higher dietary inflammation might not be associated with musculoskeletal pain in older adults. However, further investigations are required to confirm these findings.