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New Study Reports Antioxidants
May Help Lower Diabetes Rates...
Higher consumption of antioxidants in the diet in order
to lower the rate of diabetes should be made a public
health priority, according to a new study.
The findings of the study, published in the journal Nutrition,
Metabolism & Cardiovascular Diseases supports the view that
dietary antioxidants are associated with improved glycemic
biomarkers in healthy adults, as well as in diabetic patients.
According to the World Health Organization (WHO), approximately
150 million people have diabetes mellitus worldwide, and this
number may double by the year 2025 due to population growth,
aging, unhealthy diet, obesity and sedentary lifestyle.
The researchers, based at the University of Athens, said recent
studies suggested that oxidative stress is related to diabetes,
possibly originating through increased free-radical production,
with the theory proposed that pancreatic cells are particularly
susceptible to reactive oxygen species, due to their low free-radical
quenching enzymes.
"Thus, by damaging mitochondria, oxidative stress could induce
apoptosis of pancreatic beta cells, blunt insulin secretion and
dysregulate glucose levels," they explained. The scientists also
report that total dietary antioxidant capacity has been found to
be inversely related to markers of inflammation, suggesting that
inflammation and oxidative stress are interrelated.
And they explained that the hypothesis that a diet high in antioxidants
could be inversely related to the development of diabetes prompted
their decision to evaluate the relationship between glycemic indices
(glucose, insulin and insulin resistance) and dietary antioxidant
intake, in apparently healthy adults as well as in adults with diabetes.
Method
The authors said they based this study on a random sub-sample
from the well documented ATTICA study, with participants consisting
of 551 men and 467 women from all parts of the Attica region in
Greece. Complete nutritional and biochemical information was
included, they added. Dietary habits were evaluated using a
validated food-frequency questionnaire, with participants reporting
their daily or weekly average intake of several food items including
fruit, vegetables, legumes, non-alcohol beverages, chocolate, honey,
jam, nuts, rice, pastas and grains. The authors noted previous
research suggesting that a diet rich in antioxidant containing fruit
and vegetables was associated with a reduction of diabetes risk
by 13 per cent.
Overall dietary habits were assessed using a composite index that
evaluates adherence to the Mediterranean diet, and the dietary
antioxidant capacity was measured by ferric-reducing antioxidant
power (FRAP), total radical-trapping antioxidant parameter (TRAP)
and Trolox equivalent antioxidant capacity (TEAC), they specified.
The researchers said that participants were categorised as
non-diabetic, impaired fasting glucose (IFG) and diabetic and
were also defined for socio-demographic, lifestyle and health
factors such as smoking, exercise and hypertension. People with
type 1 diabetes were not included in the ATTICA study, they added.
Findings
The results indicated that higher total dietary antioxidant intake is
correlated with lower levels of glycemic indices in healthy individuals,
as well as in pre-diabetic and diabetic ones, and the findings are
an important consideration for public health planners, claim the
researchers. And the scientists added that the observed, protective
association of dietary antioxidant intake to diabetes biomarkers was
independent of age, gender and physical activity status, but did not
hold in obese individuals.
They added that further research is required, with perhaps the
inclusion also of antioxidant supplement usage, in order to
substantiate causality between high antioxidant consumption
and improved glycemic biomarkers in the general population.
Source: Nutrition, Metablolism & Cardiovascular Diseases
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