Uncovering the possible link between dietary advanced glycation end products and mortality risk: A systematic review and meta-analysis

Background: Recently, observational studies have focused on dietary advanced glycation end products (dAGEs) as predictive risk factors for chronic diseases and their related mortality. The current systematic review and meta- analysis aimed to synthesize the available evidence and quantify the possible association of dAGEs and risk of all- cause or cause-specific mortality. Methods: A comprehensive and systematic search was conducted in online literature databases, including PubMed, Scopus and Web of Science until January 2025 without any language limitation. The hazard ratio (HR) with 95 % confidence interval (CI) for the included studies were extracted and converted into log HR. Also, we used a random-effects model with inverse variance weighting method to compute the pooled effect size. Results: Six eligible studies (including 18 reports) were included in the current meta-analysis. 111,543 participants, aged 45.6-79 years old, participated in these observational studies, and the duration of follow-up varied from 3.8 to 16 years. According to the pooled results of our analysis, no significant association was observed between dAGEs and its components with the risk of all-cause mortality (HR=1.02; 95 %CI=0.92, 1.13; I2= 73.2 %), cancer mortality (HR=1.00; 95 %CI=0.88, 1.13; I2= 41.0 %) and CVDs mortality (HR=1.16; 95 % CI=0.86, 1.55; I2=86.1 %). Sex, target population, dAGEs components, region, dAGEs assessment method, and dietary data collection methods were the sources of heterogeneity. Conclusions: In conclusion, our study suggested that there was no significant association between dAGEs intake and all-cause or cause-specific mortality.