Latest News

Eating potatoes is healthy, study finds


 

Contrary to common belief, potatoes do not have a negative effect on blood glucose levels and can actually help people lose weight, according to researchers at Louisiana State University’s Pennington Biomedical Research Center, Baton Rouge.

What to know

Potatoes are filled with key nutrients, packed with health benefits, and do not increase the risk of type 2 diabetes, as has been assumed.

People tend to eat the same weight of food regardless of calorie content to feel full, so by eating foods that are heavier in weight and that are low in calories, you can reduce the number of calories you consume.

Study participants found themselves fuller, and full more quickly, and often did not even finish their meal when the high-calorie items of their meals were replaced with potatoes.

Participants had overweight, obesity, or insulin resistance, but their blood glucose levels were not negatively affected by the potato consumption, and all of those involved actually lost weight.

People typically do not stick with a diet they don’t like or that isn't varied enough, but potatoes can be prepared in numerous ways for variety in a diet, and they are a fairly inexpensive vegetable to incorporate into a diet.

This is a summary of the article, "Low-Energy Dense Potato- and Bean-Based Diets Reduce Body Weight and Insulin Resistance: A Randomized, Feeding, Equivalence Trial," published in the Journal of Medicinal Food on November 11, 2022. The full article can be found on pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov.

A version of this article first appeared on Medscape.com.

Recommended Reading

Will your smartphone be the next doctor’s office?
MDedge Endocrinology
Emotional eating tied to risk of diastolic dysfunction
MDedge Endocrinology
Size of meals, not timing, linked to weight loss
MDedge Endocrinology
Six healthy lifestyle habits linked to slowed memory decline
MDedge Endocrinology
Healthy habits lower T2D microvascular risks: Cohort study
MDedge Endocrinology
Managing respiratory symptoms in the ‘tripledemic’ era
MDedge Endocrinology
Similar brain atrophy in obesity and Alzheimer’s disease
MDedge Endocrinology
Washington medical board charges doctor with spreading COVID misinformation
MDedge Endocrinology
Exercise halves T2D risk in adults with obesity
MDedge Endocrinology
COVID emergency orders ending: What’s next?
MDedge Endocrinology