advanced glycation products

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Report #6847 6/25/96

A recent study presented at the annual meeting of the Diabetes Association

in San Francisco shows that eating browned foods may cause heart attacks,

strokes

and nerve damage.

Scientists have known for many years that cooking proteins with sugars in

the absence of water/ forms advanced glycation products that can damage

tissues

in the body. Diabetics suffer a very high incidence of nerve, artery and

kidney damage because high blood sugar levels in their bodies markedly

accelerate

the chemical reactions that form advanced glycation products.

The frightening new news is that eating foods with these advanced glycation

products raises blood and tissue levels and increases nerve damage. Cooking

with water prevents sugars from binding to proteins to form these poisonous

chemicals. Cooking without water causes sugars to combine with proteins to

form these advanced glycation products. So, baking, roasting and broiling

cause the poisonous advanced glycation products to form, while boiling and

steaming

prevent them. According to these new findings, brown foods, such as brown

cookies, brown bread crust, brown basted meats and brown beans, and even

brown

coffee beans may increase nerve damage, particularly in diabetics who are

unusually susceptible to nerve damage. On the other hand, since steamed and

boiled

vegetables, whole grains, beans and fruits are made with water, they do not

contain significant amounts of advanced glycation products. Another reason

that you should eat your fruits, vegetables whole grains and beans/ fresh,

boiled or steamed.

By Gabe Mirkin, M.D., for CBS Radio News

Helen Vlassara, at the Picower Institute for Medical Research in Manhasset,

N.Y. presented to the annual meeting of the American Diabetes Association in

San Francisco June, 1996.

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