By David Liu, PHD

Sunday Aug 26, 2012 (foodconsumer.org) -- A new study in Neurology suggests that eating foods high in flavonoids may help reduce the risk of Parkinson disease. It is a possibility only because the study was not a trial and a causal relation could not be established in the study.

X. Gao, MD, PhD of Brigham and Women's Hospital, and Harvard Medical School in Boston and colleagues conducted the study and found men who had highest intakes of dietary flavonoids were 40 percent less likely to develop Parkinson disease, compared with those who had the lowest intake.

Gao et al. examined data from 49,281 men in the Health Professional Follow-up Study and 80,36 women  in the Nurses Health Study and found the association. Of the subjects, 805 were diagnosed with Parkinson disease during 20 to 22 years of follow-up.

But the association was not observed in women.

More specifically, in the pooled analyses for the subclasses of flavonoids, intakes of anthocyanins and berries were significantly associated with a reduced risk Parkinson disease risk.    Those who had highest intakes of anthocyanins and berries were 24 and 23 percent less likely to develop Parkinson disease respectively, compared with those who had the lowest intakes.

The researchers concluded "intake of some flavonoids may reduce PD risk, particularly in men, but a protective effect of other constituents of plant foods cannot be excluded."

Flavonoids include flavanones, anthocyanins, flavan-3-ols, flavonols, flavones, and polymers. Flavonoids-rich foods include tea, berry fruits, apples, red wine, and orange/orange juice. Flavonoids are also available in the form of supplements.