Women’s Hearts at Risk from High-Carb Diets

A new study by Dutch researchers has found that certain diets that are high in processed carbohydrate-rich foods can increase heart disease risk for women. Findings of the study have been published in the current issue of the Journal of the American College of Cardiology.

For their study, lead researcher Dr. Joline Beulens of the University Medical Center, Utrecht and colleagues followed nearly 16,000 Dutch women for a period of nine years. All the women were in the range of 49 to 70 years at the beginning of the study period and none of them had heart disease.

After the follow-up period of nine years, 566 of the women had developed heart disease while 243 had suffered strokes. After making adjustments for other cardiovascular disease risk factors such as overweight, the researchers found that there were direct and close associations between the women’s dietary glycemic load and the development of heart disease and stroke.

A high glycemic load diet includes carbohydrates that are rapidly-absorbed; such carbohydrates are generally described as having “high glycemic index”. The term high glycemic index is indicative of the quality of the carbohydrates and the speed with which they are absorbed.

Foods with a high glycemic index are generally absorbed quickly and this property causes instability in insulin levels in the body which in turn affects health. High glycemic index foods include white bread, cookies, and sugary drinks.

It was observed that women whose diets contained high levels of rapidly-absorbed carbohydrates had higher risk of developing cardiovascular disease. The risk increased further if they were overweight. However the researchers were not able to quantify the risk.

“It’s a bit hard to exactly quantify the risk based on just this study,” said Dr. Beulens “However, our results showed that women consuming the highest glycemic load diets had an about 1.5 times higher risk of cardiovascular disease than those consuming the lowest glycemic load diets.”

“Looking only among overweight women, we found that overweight women consuming the highest glycemic load diets had an about 1.8 times higher risk than overweight women consuming the lowest glycemic load diets,” she added.

“The study shows that it is important to choose the right carbohydrate product in your diet,” said Dr. Beulens. “For example, choose whole grain bread instead of white or whole meal,” she said. “Choose porridge or muesli instead of cornflakes.” The researchers also noted that their findings are in tune with several other studies that have shown that a diet high in refined carbohydrates is not exactly good for the heart and overall health.

Hypothesizing about the possible connection between a high glycemic load diet and heart and blood vessel problems, Dr. Beulens said, “The most important mechanism seems to be blood lipids [fats]. A high glycemic load diet increases LDL, the bad cholesterol, and triglycerides, and may lower the good, HDL cholesterol.”

According to Dr. Frank B. Hu, a researcher at Harvard School of Public Health, the study findings indicate that a change is required in thinking, especially about the old idea that heart health benefits from simply reducing saturated fat intake. In his opinion, reducing dietary glycemic load should also be made a top public health concern.

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