4. Discussion
According to the results of this meta-analysis, the intake of total protein and animal protein was associated with a high risk of T2DM both in males and females. The intake of plant protein was associated with low risk of T2DM in females, but not in males. In high animal protein food, red meat, and processed meat were associated with a high risk of T2DM in all subjects, while total dairy products, low-fat dairy, and yogurt were associated with a low risk of T2DM in all subjects, and egg and fish were not associated with a decreased risk of T2DM. In high plant protein food, soy was associated with a low risk of T2DM in females.
Higher intake of dietary protein is often associated with lifestyles, including physical activity, body weight, smoking, drinking. For example, we already know that overweight and obesity are risk factors for T2DM, and a meta-analysis showed that each unit increase of BMI would increase the risk for T2DM by approximately 20% [
58]. In our meta-analysis, most studies were adjusted for known influencing factors, including age, BMI (Body Mass Index), smoking, physical activity, alcohol consumption, energy intake, family history of T2DM and menopausal status (among women).
The statistical power of the results could be significantly increased as the number of studies and the sample size increase, but it could also lead to heterogeneity. Some heterogeneity was due to different participants’ characteristics and regions, and different dietary assessment methods. Thus, heterogeneity is usually used to explain the study characteristics and is difficult to interpret. In our study, the heterogeneities of total protein and animal protein were in the acceptable range, but the heterogeneity of plant protein was outside of the range. We found that the European study [
10] contributed to the heterogeneity. When this study was excluded, the heterogeneities of both the overall and subgroup analyses were much lower. The reason that the European study [
10] had inconsistent results compared with other studies was not clear, but it could partly be due to the participants in this study having a lower plant protein intake than other studies [
13,
14,
15,
16,
17,
18]. For red meat and processed meat, we found that the Chinese study [
25] contributed to the heterogeneity. When this study is excluded, the heterogeneities were much lower. The reason that the Chinese study [
25] had inconsistent results may be due to the participants in this study having a lower meat intake than other participants [
6,
18,
21,
22,
23,
24,
26,
27,
28,
29,
30,
31]. For fish, we found that the Japanese study [
35] contributed to the heterogeneity, but the heterogeneity was not moderate when it was excluded, which means the association between fish and T2DM needs further refinement. For egg, we found that the Finnish study [
42] contributed to the heterogeneity. When this study is excluded, the heterogeneity was much lower. The reason why the Finnish study [
42] had inconsistent results compared with other studies was not clear, but it could partly be due to the participants in this study being older than the other studies [
18,
39,
40,
41]. For whole milk, we found that the American study [
46] contributed to the heterogeneity, and the heterogeneity was moderate when it was excluded. The reason why the American study [
46] had heterogeneity may be due to the milk intake of black women in America being different from the participants of other studies’ [
18,
43,
44,
45,
47,
48]. For yogurt, the Japanese study [
49] contributed to the heterogeneity. The reason why the Japanese study [
49] had inconsistent results was not clear, but it could partly be due to the female participants in this study being older than other studies [
18,
43,
44,
47,
48].
As meta-analysis is based on published studies, the publication bias affect is inevitable. It is particularly important to evaluate publication bias. In our meta-analysis, we used the Egger linear regression test and Begg rank correlation test to determine publication bias, and we found that there was no publication bias in our study.
Dietary protein and amino acids are involved in the modulations of insulin sensitivity and glucose metabolism. However, the results from human studies were still inconsistent. Some studies showed that high intake of dietary protein had negative effects on glucose homeostasis by facilitating insulin resistance and increasing gluconeogenesis [
7,
59,
60]. Amino acid signaling may facilitate insulin resistance, by activation of the mammalian target of rapamycin (mTOR), a nutrient sensor that operates a detrimental feedback loop toward insulin receptor substrate 1 signaling [
61,
62,
63,
64]. Moreover, amino acids may also inhibit glucose uptake through phosphorylation of downstream factors of the insulin signaling cascade by the translation initiation factor serine-kinase-6-1 [
63,
65]. On the other hand, in vivo and in vitro studies also demonstrated that amino acids play a beneficial role in glucose homeostasis by modulating insulin action on hepatic glucose production and muscle glucose transport, secretion of glucagon and insulin, as well as various tissues gene and protein expression [
64,
66]. One of the possible mechanisms that might explain this was that higher protein reduced the amount of carbohydrate intake under isoenergy conditions and thus a smaller amount of glucose was absorbed after ingestion of the meals, with the consequence of a reduced store of glycogen and, thus, a decrease in glycogenolysis rate [
67,
68]. The other possible causal mechanism was amino acids stimulating the insulin secretion to intervene in the glucose metabolism and serve as substrates for gluconeogenesis; thus, increased gluconeogenesis could stimulate insulin secretion, which might prevent hyperglycemia [
69].Additionally, some scientists think that different qualities rather than quantities of proteins play a more important role in insulin resistance [
69]. Our study supported the hypothesis that animal proteins caused a high risk of T2DM in males and females, and plant proteins were protection factors of T2DM in females. We can find some support for this from the literature. The abundance in certain amino acids are different between animal proteins and plant proteins. This may contribute to the different effects between them on the risk of T2DM. Typically, plant protein contains lower levels of the branched chain amino acids leucine, isoleucine and valine and of the sulfur amino acid methionine as compared with animal proteins [
70]. Branched chain amino acids and higher methionine intake have been associated with insulin resistance and type 2 diabetes [
71,
72]. In addition, dietary glycine is also mainly consumed from animal-based foods and some cohort studies have shown that glycine was positively associated with T2DM, and hypertension [
72,
73]. On the other hand, dietary glutamic acid, an amino acid that is mainly consumed from plant protein was found to be inversely associated with risks of hypertension and arterial stiffness [
73,
74]. So far, three intervention studies have compared the effects of animal protein with plant protein meals on glycaemic variables in people with T2DM, but they were obtained from three different results [
75,
76,
77]. This should be further investigated in future studies.
From the current literature available, the inconsistency in association between plant protein and T2DM was probably due to gender difference. The negative association between plant protein or soy and T2DM was observed mainly in women, while most of the studies in men found null results. Therefore, results from all subjects without considering gender difference were different and the proportion of women in the study may influence the results. However, the exact mechanism is unclear.
In order to further refine and compare the association between different food sources of protein and T2DM, and facilitate dietary guidance, we have analyzed the relationship between different high-protein food and the risk of type 2 diabetes. We found that different high-protein foods play different roles in T2DM, even if they are all animal-based foods. Our results indicated that the intake of red meat and processed meat are risk factors for T2DM. They are also positively associated with weight gain [
78], stroke [
79], coronary heart disease [
80] and mortality [
81].First, the increased meat protein may increase iron load, which was associated with the increased risk of T2DM [
82]. Moreover, the other nutrients in red and processed meat, including nitrites and advanced glycation end products, were also thought to mediate the association between meat intake and the risk of T2DM [
83].The relationship between egg consumption and T2DM was not clear. Some studies have shown that egg intake was associated with a lower risk of T2DM [
42].Some research showed that egg consumption was positively associated with the risk of T2DM in our study [
39,
84,
85], and this result was supported by the AHA dietary guidelines which advise restricted egg consumption in adults for preventing cardiometabolic diseases [
86,
87,
88].We found that total dairy products, whole milk, and yogurt intake were protective factors for T2DM. Some studies showed that milk proteins, like whey protein, may enhance satiety and reduce risk factors for T2DM [
89]. The calcium and vitamin D in milk and its products may also contribute to its beneficial effects on T2DM [
90].In our study, fish consumption was not associated with decreased risk of T2DM. This result may partly relate on the increase in plasma selenium level with the increment of fish intake, which may increase the risk of diabetes [
91,
92].The relationship between fish intake and the risk of T2DM needs further refinement. For high plant protein-based foods, there was a negative association between soy consumption and the risk of T2DM in this study. Soy protein may inhibit insulin secretion from pancreatic β cells or inhibit lipogenesis and enhance lipolysis in the adipose and liver to reduce adiposity [
93].This protective effect may also be associated with biologically active ingredients such as phytoestrogen in soybeans [
94].
Our meta-analysis also had limitations. First, publications into our research were adjusted for BMI, but some studies had measurement errors because of self-reporting of height and weight, resulting in the BMI relying on self-reporting, which could lead to confounding results. Second, some important factors that influence T2DM such as fiber, lipids, and carbohydrates, were only adjusted in some of these studies, which may also lead to confounding results. Additionally, limitations might be due to temporal bias. Studies with longer follow-up might beless influenced by temporal bias. In our studies, the follow-up period of each research study was different, so the temporal bias might impact the association between dietary protein intake and the risk of T2DM.