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 People who followed a healthy diet and drank a glass of red wine at
dinner for two years ended up with better HDL or “good” cholesterol
and other good health-related factors than people on the same diet
who drank mineral water, researchers found.
But what the findings actually mean for individual patients needs to
be interpreted cautiously, and with careful medical follow-up, said
Iris Shai, the study’s senior author from Ben-Gurion University of
the Negev in Beer Sheva, Israel.
The risks and benefits of alcohol use among people with diabetes
have been controversial, Shai and her colleagues write in Annals of
Internal Medicine. While studies suggest possible benefits to
moderate alcohol use, both with diabetes and without it, it’s
questionable whether doctors should tell their diabetes patients to
drink, they say.
For the new study, the researchers randomly assigned 224 adults with
type 2 diabetes, ages 40 to 75, to drink 150 milliliters (about 5
ounces) of either mineral water, white wine or red wine with dinner
for two years. The participants were previously not alcohol
drinkers. As part of the study, they also followed a Mediterranean
diet, which emphasizes plant-based foods, whole grains, legumes and
nuts, and replacing butter with healthy fats.
Overall, 87 percent completed the trial, with 80 percent drinking
their daily dose of wine.
At the end of the study, people who drank red wine with dinner
increased their “good” HDL cholesterol, which helps removes LDL or
“bad” cholesterol from the arteries. They also lowered their risk of
heart disease, as indicated by a lower ratio of total cholesterol to
HDL cholesterol.
The researchers also looked for conditions that together make up the
metabolic syndrome, which increases the risk of heart disease,
diabetes and stroke. Compared to participants who drank mineral
water, those in the red wine group had fewer of those conditions,
such as a large waistline and high blood pressure, for example.
But except for a subset of participants whose livers processed
alcohol relatively slowly, most people in the study did not have any
improvements in their blood sugar levels.
And the researchers can’t say fewer heart attacks or deaths occur
among people who drink wine at dinner, compared to people who drink
mineral water.
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“Although red wine was superior and preferable, we would not
recommend to completely stick only to it, but to enjoy from both
wines in moderation, and as part of a healthy diet,” Shai said.
She said the next step should be to study rates of illness and death
in a multi-center large alcohol randomized controlled trials, which
are considered the “gold standard” of medical research.
Dr. Sethu Reddy, Chief of the Adult Diabetes Section at Joslin
Diabetes Center in Boston, told Reuters Health by email that he
doesn’t think the benefits to cholesterol, metabolic risk factors
and blood sugar control were large enough to make a practical
difference.
And, while he would not have any major concerns if a patient wanted
to add a glass of wine with dinner, he warned that wine itself can
impact people’s blood sugar.
“As always, drinking alcohol along with food is a better idea than
drinking alcohol alone,” Dr. Reddy said. He would also ask the
patient “to check before and after meal sugars to see if alcohol is
having any immediate impact on sugar control.”
SOURCE: http://bit.ly/1jsYpAz Annals of Internal Medicine, online
October 12, 2015.
(The story was refiled to change the last sentence of paragraph 5 to
say "which emphasizes plant-based foods, whole grains, legumes and
nuts, and replacing butter with healthy fats")
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