May 15 (UPI) -- Consuming yogurt may
help reduce chronic inflammation, which is a factor in bowel and
cardiovascular disease, arthritis, asthma and obesity, according to a
new study conducted in Wisconsin, known as the dairy capital of the
United States.
Researchers at the University of Wisconsin at Madison studied the
effects of yogurt on chronic inflammation, which is when the body
attacks itself and affects organs and systems. Their findings were
published Monday in the Journal of Nutrition.
"Eating eight ounces of low-fat yogurt before a meal is a feasible
strategy to improve post-meal metabolism and thus may help reduce the
risk of cardiovascular and metabolic diseases," Ruisong Pei, a
UW-Madison food science postdoctoral researcher involved in the studies,
said in
press release.
As part of the body's innate immune system, inflammation is the first
line of defense against illness and injury. But it becomes harmful when
the inflammatory response lasts too long.
Anti-inflammatory medications -- including aspirin, naproxen,
hydrocortisone and prednisone -- reduce the effects of chronic
inflammation by improving the intestinal lining. It prevents endotoxins,
which are pro-inflammatory molecules made by gut microbes, from
entering the blood stream.
But the drugs have risks and side effects.
For two decades, researchers previously explored dairy products as a potential dietary treatment.
"There have been some mixed results over the years, but [a recent
article] shows that things are pointing more toward anti-inflammatory,
particularly for fermented dairy," said Brad Bolling, an assistant
professor of food science at the school. He cited a 2017 review paper
that assessed 52 clinical trials.
"I wanted to look at the mechanism more closely and look specifically at yogurt," Bolling said.
Bolling and his researchers enrolled 120 premenopausal women, 50
percent of whom were obese and the other 50 percent non-obese. For nine
weeks, half of the participants were assigned to eat 12 ounces of
low-fat yogurt every day and a control group ate non-dairy pudding.
During the study, blood samples were studied.
"The results indicate that ongoing consumption of yogurt may be having a general anti-inflammatory effect," Bolling said.
In new research, participants were also involved in a high-calorie
meal challenge at the beginning and end of their nine-week dietary
intervention. They started with yogurt or non-dairy pudding followed by a
large high-fat, high-carb breakfast meal.
"It was two sausage muffins and two hash browns, for a total of 900
calories. But everybody managed it. They'd been fasting, and they were
pretty hungry," Bolling said.
In both challenges, blood work showed that the yogurt "appetizer"
helped improve some key biomarkers of endotoxin exposure and
inflammation. Also glucose metabolism improved in obese participants in
speeding the reduction of post-meal blood glucose levels.
Researchers couldn't find compounds in yogurt responsible for the shift in biomarkers or how they act in the body.
"The goal is to identify the components and then get human evidence
to support their mechanism of action in the body. That's the direction
we are going," Bolling said. "Ultimately, we would like to see these
components optimized in foods, particularly for medical situations where
it's important to inhibit inflammation through the diet. We think this
is a promising approach."
