While I'm on the topic of diets, and what makes a healthful one, I saw this study in the July issue of Nutrition Research:Antioxidant Vitamins Reduce Acute Meal-Induced Memory Deficits In Adults With Type 2 Diabetes
Some background:
"Memory impairment is observed in adults with type 2 diabetes mellitus, with further acute deficits after meal ingestion."Those memory problems after eating are thought to arise from damage to brain tissue wrought by free radicals that are produced during metabolism of food components.
The researchers were investigating whether consumption of antioxidant vitamins along with a meal could lessen memory problems, possibly by quenching those free radicals. They fed a group of 16 adults with type 2 diabetes one of the following (in a crossover design):
- High-fat meal
- High-fat meal with vitamin C (1000 mg) and vitamin E (800 IU)
- Water
"Relative to water consumption, the high-fat meal resulted in poorer performance at 105 minutes postingestion on measures of delayed verbal recall (word list and paragraph recall) and working memory (Digit-Span Forward). Coconsumption of antioxidant vitamins and high-fat meal prevented this meal-induced deficit such that performance on these tasks was indistinguishable from that after water intake."ScienceDaily has a nice summary, including this statement from the study's lead author Michael Herman Chui:
"Our bottom line is that consuming unhealthy meals for those with diabetes can temporarily further worsen already underlying memory problems associated with the disease. We've shown that antioxidant vitamins can minimize oxidative stress from the meal and reduce those immediate memory deficits."It remains to be seen whether antioxidant vitamins were working by reducing damage from free radicals, or by another method.
The senior author of the study, Dr. Carol Greenwood added:
"While our study looked at the pill form of antioxidants, we would ultimately want individuals to consume healthier foods high in antioxidants, like fruits and vegetables."
