Fish consumption and the risk of stroke: a dose-response meta-analysis.

Abstract

Fish consumption has been postulated to reduce the risk of stroke. We conducted a dose-response meta-analysis to summarize the evidence from prospective studies regarding the association between fish consumption and stroke risk. Pertinent studies were identified by searching Embase and PubMed through May 2011 and by reviewing the references of retrieved articles. We included prospective studies that reported relative risks with 95% CIs of stroke for ≥3 categories of fish consumption. Results were combined using a random-effects model. Fifteen prospective studies, with 9360 stroke events among 383 838 participants, were included. An increment of 3 servings/week in fish consumption was associated with a 6% reduction in risk of total stroke (relative risk, 0.94; 95% CI, 0.89-0.99) without heterogeneity among studies (P=0.15, I2=25.7%). Among 9 studies with results for stroke subtypes, the relative risks were 0.90 (95% CI, 0.84-0.97) for ischemic stroke and 0.90 (95% CI, 0.76-1.06) for hemorrhagic stroke. These findings indicate that fish consumption is weakly inversely associated with the risk of stroke.