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Monday, April 19, 2010

ORANGE JUICE, HIGH CALORIE FOODS AND INFLAMMATION-THE CONNECTION

A balanced food with adequate calories and proteins can prevent many life style disorders in humans where as high carbohydrate or fat containing foods when consumed regularly may cause havoc to the health condition of even a normally healthy person. The calorie rich foods containing too much sugar or high amounts of fat have been found to cause inflammation at the cellular level leading to undesirable changes in the functioning of the body causing varied disorders. While moderating food consumption is the most logical step to protect one's health, the recent findings that consuming orange juice can neutralize the adverse effect of bad diets can give some comfort to consumers.

The study involved three groups of 10 normal-weight healthy men and women between the ages of 20 and 40. After an overnight fast, participants ate a 900-calorie breakfast composed of an egg "muffin" sandwich, a sausage "muffin" sandwich and a serving of hash browns. The meal contained 81 grams of carbohydrates, 51 grams of fat and 32 grams protein. Along with the breakfast, one group drank 300 calories of "not-from-concentrate" orange juice, a second group drank a 300-calorie glucose drink and the third group drank an equal amount of water. All participants were given 15 minutes to finish their food and drink. Blood samples were collected before the meal and at 1, 3 and 5 hours after wards. There was no significant difference in inflammatory mediators among the groups before the meal.

Analysis of the samples after the meal showed that oxygen free radicals increased an average of 62 percent with water, 63 percent with the glucose and 47 percent with orange juice. There also was an increase in blood components known as toll-like receptors, which play an important role in the development of inflammation, atherosclerosis, obesity, insulin resistance, and injury to cardiac cells than can occur after a blocked vessel is reopened. Orange juice also prevented a significant increase in SOCS-3, an important mediator of insulin resistance, which contributes to development of type 2 diabetes. "These data emphasize that a high-fat, high-carbohydrate meal is profoundly and rapidly pro inflammatory, and that this process occurs at the cellular and molecular level," says Paresh Dandona, MD, UB distinguished professor of medicine, director of the Diabetes-Endocrinology Center of Western New York at Kaleida Health and senior author on the study.

"In addition, specific pro inflammatory genes are activated after the intake of glucose and a high-fat, high-carbohydrate meal, and these changes are observed in mono nuclear cells that participate in vascular inflammation and insulin resistance," he says."These observations extend our previous work showing oxidative and inflammatory stress following such meals by demonstrating a remarkable increase in the mediators of insulin resistance after a single meal, and the equally remarkable prevention of these changes following the intake of orange juice." Dandona emphasizes that vascular inflammation is an essential component of atherosclerosis, and that this inflammation may become permanent if a person consumes similar meals regularly."The choice of safe foods that are not pro inflammatory may provide protection from the unending cycle of postprandial and cumulative inflammation," he says. "This choice may lower the risk of atherosclerosis and resistance to insulin."

Drinking a glass of orange juice during breakfast is a standard practice in many countries and people there invariably take heavy breakfast which is the first food of the day on an empty stomach. How far this good habit has given way to uncontrolled consumption of other high calorie drinks amongst the young consumers is a matter of conjecture. It is up to the parents to bring orange juice back to the dining table as a part of the breakfast sooner than later!

V.H.POTTY
http://vhpotty.blogspot.com/
http://foodtechupdates.blogspot.com

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