YOUR OPINION

Are nuts fattening?

• Yes
• No
• I don’t know

 

These results have been published in the prestigious journal Nutrition, Metabolism and Cardiovascular Disease by the researchers of the EFINUT study, under the direction of the Human Nutrition Team at the Faculty of Medicine of the Rovira i Virgili University (URV) and the NURETA group of the CIBERobn, Carlos III Health Institute (Spain).

 

Up until now, no studies had been undertaken to establish whether nuts could improve insulin resistance, a stage prior to the appearance of diabetes. The Human Nutrition Department at the Reus Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences decided to study this subject on a group of non-diabetic volunteers with metabolic syndrome, a combination of metabolic disorders associated with abdominal obesity which can lead to diabetes and cardiovascular disease.

 

The EFINUT study involved recommending a low-fat healthy diet for 12 weeks to a group of volunteers with metabolic syndrome. Half of the volunteers were also given 30 grams of mixed nuts per day to add to their habitual diet.

 

According to the first published results of this study, co-financed by the INC, volunteers who added a daily portion of nuts to their diet (walnuts, hazelnuts and almonds) showed improvements in various parameters associated with the risk of developing cardiovascular disease (inflammation and oxidation parameters) and also significantly reduced their insulin resistance. These results suggest that eating nuts regularly to the diet can reduce the risk of developing coronary disease and diabetes.

 

INC and URV Press Conference
Tarragona, Spain, January 14th, 2010

 

Thursday January 14, 2010, the INC in cooperation with the University Rovira i Virgili (URV) organized a press conference in Tarragona, Spain. This press conference included the participation of Prof. Jordi Salas-Salvadó, Chair in Nutrition and Bromatology at the Reus Faculty of Medicine, and member of the INC Scientific Committee, and his colleagues Dr. Montse Bulló and Dr. Patricia Casas.

 

The objective of the press conference was to inform the media and civil society about the results of the study “Effects of one serving of mixed nuts on serum lipids, insulin resistance and inflammatory markers in patients with the metabolic syndrome”.