A low-carb diet meets nutrient requirements and promotes heart health by enriching essential nutrients.

Find out how a low-carb diet plan not only meets your daily nutrient needs but also improves heart health by improving essential fat and sodium-potassium balance, challenging common sense of food.

Study: Nutrient analysis of three low-carbohydrate foods that differ in carbohydrate content. Image Credit: Chinnapong / Shutterstock

Article published in Nutritional Limits provides a complete nutritional summary of three different low-carb foods carbohydrate content.

Rear end

The popularity of low-carbohydrate diets is increasing worldwide, especially among middle-aged women. A low-carb diet contains less than 130 grams of carbohydrates per day, or 10-25% of energy from carbohydrates. Similarly, very low-carb diets contain 20-50 grams of carbohydrate or less than 10% of energy from carbohydrates per day.

Many studies have found that a low-carbohydrate diet is effective in treating a variety of chronic metabolic diseases, including type 2 diabetes, metabolic syndrome, obesity and polycystic ovarian syndrome.

Differences in the prevalence of cardiovascular disease have been observed among people of race, ethnicity, socioeconomic status, and culture. As noted in the study, well-designed low-carbohydrate diets are can act as an effective intervention to address such health inequities.

The Recommended Dietary Allowance (RDA) for total carbohydrates is 130 grams per day, estimated based on the average glucose used by the brain each day. This limitation has been a major obstacle to the inclusion of low-carbohydrate diets in current dietary guidelines despite clinical evidence supporting their benefits.

In this study, scientists have estimated the macro- and micronutrients of a diet with three carbohydrates for 7 days intended to evaluate the nutritional value of different types of carbohydrate restriction.

Educational design

The study analyzed the nutrient content of two very low carbohydrate diets and a low carbohydrate diet, providing 20, 40, and 100 grams of net carbohydrate per day, respectively. Net carbohydrates refer to non-fiber saccharides that are digestible by humans.

The public health concerns listed in the 2020 Dietary Guidelines for Americans were considered when selecting foods for the food plans. In particular, these diet plans were designed to follow the dietary patterns used in ketogenic and low-carb diet studies as well as commercial low-carb diets.

The nutrient content of the food plan was analyzed using the US Department of Agriculture’s Food Data Central, which includes five different types of data that provide information on food and nutrient profiles.

Important information

An energy and nutrient analysis of three meal plans showed that two very low-carb meals with 20 grams and 40 grams of carbohydrates (VLCD20 and VLCD40) and low-carb meals carbohydrates containing 100 grams of carbohydrates (LCD100) provide 91%, 94%, and 100% of the RDA for energy, respectively, in women aged 31 – 70 years.

For older women ages 51 – 70, VLCD20 and VLCD40 meet the RDA for energy; however, the LCD100 provided 12% more power than the RDA. For men, none of the dietary plans meet the RDA for energy in all age groups.

In men and women aged 31 – 70 years, VLCD20, VLCD40, and LCD100 provided 37, 55, and 98% of the RDA for dietary carbohydrates, respectively. In women aged 31 – 70, VLCD40 and LCD100 provided 9 and 16% more dietary fiber than the RDA, respectively. However, VLCD20 does not meet the RDA for dietary fiber in this age group.

In older women aged 51 – 70, VLCD20 provided adequate dietary fiber, and VLCD40 and LCD100 exceeded the RDA by more than 20%. For men ages 31 – 70, none of the meal plans meet the RDA for dietary fiber; however, VLCD40 and LCD100 met demand among older men aged 51 – 70.

All three meal plans provided more protein than the RDA for men and women ages 31 – 70. However, the amounts were within the Acceptable Macronutrient Distribution Range of 10- 35% of the energy.

In terms of saturated fat and sodium, all diet plans slightly exceed the RDA. However, the study highlights that despite this, the ratio of omega-6 to omega-3 fatty acids was much lower than the average American diet, which may provide protective benefits against chronic diseases. The ratio of sodium to potassium in these three foods was also good, remaining less than one, which is considered good for heart health. This is especially noteworthy since many American diets exceed the recommended amount of sodium and are deficient in potassium, a trend associated with increased heart risk.

Essential micronutrients

All three dietary plans exceed the RDA for vitamins A, C, D, E, and K, thiamin, riboflavin, niacin, B6, folate, and B12 for adults aged 31 – 70 years and the RDA for calcium for adults aged 31-50. However, all values ​​remained below the Tolerable Upper Intake Level.

For women aged 31 – 50, all three dietary plans met or exceeded the Recommended Average Requirement for protein and essential micronutrients.

The importance of learning

This study shows that low-carbohydrate diets designed to provide carbohydrates below the RDA would provide sufficient fiber and micronutrients in the American diet.

In addition, research suggests that these well-designed meal plans not only meet but may even exceed the nutritional requirements for essential nutrients in certain populations, particularly women of age. 31-50, who are likely to follow this diet. This challenges the widespread perception that low-carbohydrate diets are unhealthy and emphasizes the importance of considering food quality, not just carbohydrate content, in dietary guidelines.

This study also highlights the importance of the ratio of omega-6 to omega-3 fatty acids and sodium to potassium provided by food, especially for people with metabolic health problems. These components may play an important role in reducing the risk of chronic diseases, such as cardiovascular disease, in people who adhere to a low-carbohydrate diet.