Story last updated at 7:10 a.m. Monday, September 8, 2003

Adding whole grain 'good carbohydrates' to daily diet helps prevent disease

United Feature Syndicate

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Q: Everywhere I look it seems carbohydrates are the enemy of a healthy diet. I thought that whole grains and cereals were good for you. Is that not true anymore?

A: Don't listen to people who say that all carbohydrates are bad for you. There are "good carbs" and "bad carbs," and the media focus on low-carbohydrate diets is creating a huge hole in the heart of the average American diet, with too few whole grains. That's a shame because eating whole grains and whole-grain foods instead of highly processed ones is good for you. This food group can help lower cholesterol, improve blood sugar and insulin levels and keep your digestive system healthy. It may also help you control your weight and fend off heart disease, diabetes and some cancers.

Highly processed carbohydrates, such as white flour and white rice, have a high "glycemic index" or "glycemic load." They cause a quick blast of blood sugar followed by a sudden sharp rise in insulin. High levels of sugar and insulin may increase the chances of developing diabetes, heart disease and other problems.

The sugar levels then rapidly fall, which makes you hungry sooner than you should be, so you eat too much. Whole grains bring slower, steadier increases in blood sugar and insulin, which is much healthier. They also deliver far more fiber, vitamins, minerals and other healthful nutrients.

Researchers have begun to look closely at how the quality of carbohydrates affects health. Most studies, including some from several different Harvard teams, show a connection between eating whole grains and better health. Here's a quick summary of several recent findings on the effects of good carbs on different diseases.

Cardiovascular disease: Eating whole grains instead of refined grains substantially lowers total cholesterol, low-density lipoprotein (LDL, or bad) cholesterol, triglycerides and insulin levels. Any of these changes theoretically reduces the risk for cardiovascular disease. In the Harvard-based Nurses' Health Study, women who ate two to three servings of whole-grain products (mostly bread and breakfast cereals) each day were 30 percent less likely to have a heart attack or die from heart disease over a 10-year period than women who ate less than one serving per week.

Type 2 diabetes: In that same Nurses' Health Study and its male counterpart, the Health Professionals Follow-Up Study, men and women who rarely ate whole grains (one serving a week or less) were more likely to develop type 2 diabetes compared with those who ate two to three servings per day.

Cancer: Preliminary findings suggest that people who regularly eat whole grains develop cancer less often than those who don't. A 1998 overview of 40 studies that looked at various types of cancer linked consumption of whole grains with reduced risks of stomach, colon, mouth, gallbladder and ovarian cancers.

Digestive health: Whole grains help prevent constipation, a common and aggravating problem. It also helps prevent diverticular disease (the development of tiny pouches inside the colon that are easily irritated and inflamed).

If whole grains are part of your diet, congratulations.

You've already broadened your culinary horizons, discovered some new tastes and done your health a favor. If you don't eat whole grains, it's easy to add a serving or more a day. Here are some tips for getting more whole grains:

-- The cereal aisles of most grocery stores offer many whole-grain choices. If you favor hot cereals, trade your Cream of Wheat for oatmeal.

-- Try whole-wheat toast, a whole-wheat English muffin, or a whole-grain bagel.

-- Make your sandwich with whole-wheat bread or pack it in a whole-wheat pita.

-- Snack on whole-wheat crackers or air-popped popcorn.

-- If you like pasta, try one of the semolina/whole-wheat blends now on the market.

-- Whole-wheat couscous cooks in a few minutes and tastes a lot like couscous made from refined wheat.

-- Instant brown rice is ready in the time it takes to make white rice.

-- If you're feeling adventurous, try cooking wheat berries, cracked wheat, quinoa (KEEN-wah) or wild rice.

Sorting out whole grains from refined grains is sometimes a snap. Brown rice is a whole grain; white rice isn't.

When in doubt, check the ingredients label. A whole-grain product will list whole wheat, oats, rye, or some other whole grain as the first ingredient.

Don't be fooled by the phrase "made with wheat flour," as that's true of even the most refined white cake flour.

You can also look for a "whole grain" stamp on the label.

Although carbohydrate quality is important, carbohydrate quantity matters as well. Eating huge portions of whole grains or snacking on a half box of whole-grain crackers can counteract the health benefits of whole grains if the extra calories cause you to become overweight.


The Harvard Medical School Adviser is researched and written by the faculty and staff of the Harvard Medical School. You can e-mail questions to the Harvard Medical School Adviser at Harvard Adviser~hms.harvard.edu. For more consumer health information and a listing of publications available from Harvard Health Publications, visit www.health.harvard.edu or to order publications call (877) 649-9457 toll-free.

I think I detect a trend here, the starch lovers are trying to put the onus the public - "we told you to eat healty carbs, and you ate bagels, what did you expect? You must LISTEN to us!" Well, it won't wash, all the items on their list of "wholegrains" are incredibly high GI. A very trivial dif between brown rice and white. So called whole wheat bread, bagels, whatever, virtually the same GI, and in some cases worse because its the fashion to sweeten those products - honey-oat, pumpernickel with molasses and some such. Is the corn used in Taco Bell's tortillas whole grain? could be, but look what it does to blood sugars. They're trying to salvage SOMETHING from their nutso diet.

Let's start fromt he beginning: "Lowers Cholesterol." This is true...but, what they omit is that Grains tend to substantially lower HDL (Good Cholesterol) as well as LDL (Bad Cholesterol). This may actually worsen your ratio of Good/Bad Cholesterol. "Improve Blood Sugar." As compared to what ??? Twinkies ??? They have a GI only marginally lower than Refined Grains. The amount of "improvement" is almost none. "Helps the Digestive System." I call BULLSHIT !!! For starters, when I eat lots of starch (refined or whole), I get horrbile acid reflux. Not exactly an "improvement" if you ask me. As for weight...eating a diet high in grain is what made me fat [Pasta -- GI: 32-65.] By comparison Whole Wheat Bread [which they suggest] has a GI of 52-87. "Fends off Heart Disease" ??? Not if it reduces your HDL (Good Cholesterol.) "Prevents Diabetes" ??? Again, compared against what ??? A Twinkie ???



White Bread -- GI: 69 to 87
Whole Wheat Bread -- GI: 52 to 87

Some White Breads got GIs even lower than Whole Wheat when enriched with Fiber.



It is only slightly slower absorbed. As for "far more" Fiber...That's Bullshit. You get a fraction of a gram more Fiber by going with Whole Wheat. As for the vitamins and minerals, the nutrient profiles are almost identical. Both are very low in vitamins and minerals...having no more than 5%RDA of anything...except Sodium. In fact, by law...White Bread has to be fortified with the same Vitamins/Minerals that are present in the Whole Grain it was refined from.



Let's see...they took folks who ate Twinkies, White Bread, and such and started feeding them Whole Foods...and somehow this proves that Whole Grains are good for you ??? The only thing this study proves is that those who eat Whole Grains are slightly healthier than those who eat Twinkies and White Bread. If they compared them against people who don't eat much grain, I'd bet the Low-Grain folks would have better numbers.



Again, those eating <1 serving of Whole Grain were most likely doing so because they were eating several servings of Refined Grain. This proves nothing more than that Whole Grains are marginally better than Refined Grains.



Same BS. See my comments above.



Now, he gets it partly right...Eating too much Whole Grain will worsen your health. But, it isn't the Calories, it is the carbs and glycemic load. IMHO, eating grain products on a daily basis is excessive. Before I became overweight I ate grain products maybe once a week. When I was overweight, I ate grain products on a daily basis. In fact, grain went from an occassional treat [Before 1995] to a large part of my diet [1995-1999] and eventually became the crux of my diet [1999-2002.]