Low GI Diet Decreases Some Heart Disease Risk Factors

BOSTON--Following a low glycemic-index (GI) diet appears to be more beneficial than a traditional low-fat diet in reducing cardiovascular disease risk factors in obese youth, according to researchers from Boston Children's Hospital. In their study, published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition (81, 5:976-82, 2005), the researchers compared the two dietary treatments in 23 obese young adults over one year. The low GI diet emphasized ad libitum consumption of low GI foods, with up to 50 percent of energy from carbs and 35 percent from fat; the low-fat diet restricted calorie intake and fat (<30 percent of energy) with up to 60 percent of the calories from carbs.

Body weight decreased significantly over a six-month intensive intervention in both groups, and remained below baseline at one year. There were no differences between the two groups in changes in cholesterol concentrations, blood pressure or insulin sensitivity. However, the low GI diet promoted a significantly greater decline in plasma triacylglycerols (37.2 percent compared to 19.1 percent); also, plasminogen activator inhibitor 1 concentrations decreased by 39 percent in the low GI group, but increased 33 percent in the low fat diet group.

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