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Antioxidant-rich foods may reduce type 2 diabetes risk in women
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Middle-aged woman who consume more antioxidant-rich foods are less likely to develop type 2 diabetes after 15 years vs. women who consumer lower amounts of such foods, according to findings from a prospective study conducted in France.
“Recently, an index of the total antioxidant capacity of foods, which describes the ability of food antioxidants to scavenge preformed free radicals, has been suggested as a tool for investigating the health effects of antioxidants present in mixed diets,” Francesca Romana Mancini, DVM, PhD, a researcher with the Centre for Research in Epidemiology and Population Health at INSERM in Villejuif, France, and colleagues wrote in the study background. “The total antioxidant capacity concept aims to group the capacities from all dietary antioxidants into a single estimate. A high total antioxidant capacity has been related to several health benefits in cohort, cross-sectional and interventional studies.”
Mancini and colleagues analyzed data from 64,233 women without diabetes at baseline, born between 1925 and 1950, participating in the E3N-European Prospective Investigation into Cancer and Nutrition (EPIC) study, a prospective cohort initiated in France in 1990 to study risk factors for cancer and chronic conditions in women. All women completed validated 208-item dietary questionnaires. Researchers estimated total antioxidant capacity (excluding the contribution of coffee) with the ferric ion reducing antioxidant power method, and used adjusted Cox proportional hazards regression models to calculate HRs for the associations between total antioxidant capacity and type 2 diabetes risk, using age as the time scale. Total antioxidant consumption was stratified by quintile, with the reference group consuming 8.72 mmol per day or less in total antioxidant capacity.
During follow-up (between June 1993 and December 2008), 1,751 women developed type 2 diabetes. Food groups that contributed most total antioxidant capacity were fruit (23%), vegetables (19%), alcohol (15%) and hot beverages, such as tea, chicory and hot chocolate (12%).
Compared with women in the lowest quintile for total antioxidant consumption, women in the fifth quintile of total antioxidant consumption ( 17.55 mmol per day) were 39% less likely to develop type 2 diabetes during follow-up (HR = 0.61; 95% CI, 0.5-0.74). The strength of the association decreased, but remained significant, when adjusted for BMI (HR = 0.73; 95% CI, 0.6-0.89), according to researchers.
They also found that the inverse association between total antioxidant capacity and type 2 diabetes risk was linear up to ferric ion reducing antioxidant power values of 15 mmol per day, after which a plateau effect was reached.
The strength of the association decreased further when coffee consumption was included in the total antioxidant capacity index, with HRs of 0.83 (95% CI, 0.71-0.97) for the third and fourth quintiles and 0.76 (95% CI, 0.65-0.89) for the fifth quintile vs. the first quintile.
“This work complements our current knowledge of the effect of isolated foods and nutrients, and provides a more comprehensive view of the relationship between food and type 2 diabetes,” Guy Fagherazzi, PhD, a researcher with the Centre for Research in Epidemiology and Population Health, said in a press release. “We have shown that an increased intake of antioxidants can contribute to a reduction in diabetes risk.”
Mancini noted that the findings raise additional questions regarding the mechanisms behind the link.
“We know that these molecules counterbalance the effect of free radicals, which are damaging to cells, but there are likely to be more specific actions in addition to this, for example, an effect on the sensitivity of cells to insulin,” Mancini said in the release. “This will need to be confirmed in future studies.” – by Regina Schaffer
Disclosures: The authors report no relevant financial disclosures.
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