Fact: The Quality of Carbohydrates Matters in Reducing Diabetes Risk
Consuming high-quality carbohydrates, particularly whole grains, lowered the risk for type 2 diabetes, according to data presented at Nutrition 2020 Live Online, June 1-4, 2020. The results were from analysis of dietary data for three large prospective U.S. cohorts, encompassing more than 200,727 participants who were enrolled in the Nurses’ Health Study, Nurses’ Health Study II, and Health Professionals Follow-up Study. Collectively, their analysis represented almost 4 million years of follow-up. The researchers identified 11,872 documented cases of type 2 diabetes in their analysis. They found that replacing 5% of energy from saturated fat with 5% of energy from low-quality carbohydrates — refined grains, sugary foods, and potatoes — was associated with a higher type 2 diabetes risk (HR = 1.05; 95% CI, 1-1.09). However, substituting 5% of energy from saturated fat with high- quality carbohydrates, such as whole-grain bread, brown rice, rye, barley, and quinoa, was associated with a lower type 2 diabetes risk (HR = 0.93; 95% CI, 0.87-0.99). Further, the isocaloric substitution of other macronutrients with low-quality carbohydrates was not associated with type 2 diabetes risk. Conversely, isocaloric substitution of high-quality carbohydrates was associated with lower type 2 diabetes risk when the replacement nutrient was monounsaturated fat (HR = 0.88; 95% CI, 0.83-0.94), animal protein (HR = 0.88; 95% CI, 0.83-0.93), vegetable protein (HR = 0.9; 95% CI, 0.84-0.96), trans fat (HR = 0.9; 95% CI, 0.85-0.97) and polyunsaturated fat (HR = 0.92; 95% CI, 0.86-0.98. “When individuals consume a low-fat diet, the replacement nutrient is almost always low quality or refined carbohydrates that this study shows to be associated with a higher risk for type 2 diabetes,” noted the researchers; “The quality of carbohydrate matters.” Journal of Nutrition 2020 Diabetologia | 