Written by Greg Arnold, DC, CSCS. Antioxidants unique to oats significantly reduce markers of inflammation by 53.2%, 45.8%, and 3% in three tests.
Oats are a food group that contains high levels of antioxidants such as vitamin E (in the form of both tocopherols and tocotrienols) and other antioxidants called flavonoids (1). But the real health properties of oats may lie in a group of antioxidants unique to oats called avenanthramides, of which there are 40 different types (2). Avenanthramides are potent antioxidants (3) that help control inflammation levels and decrease blood clotting (4).
Now a new study (5) suggests that avenanthramides may help with inflammation levels after exercise. The study involved 16 postmenopausal women aged 50 to 80. Eight women were given 2 cookies made with oats containing 9.2 milligrams of Avenanthramide and eight women were given 2 cookies containing 0.4 milligrams of Avenanthramide (control group) per day for 8 weeks.
Before and after the cookies were provided, each woman completed a downhill walk (-9% decline) on a treadmill at 2.4 miles per hour for 15 minutes, repeating this 4 times with 5 minutes rest between each 15-minute walk. Blood samples were collected after each hour-long treadmill session and then 24 and 48 hours after each session.
The researchers noted that the Avenanthramide supplementation significantly affected 3 inflammatory proteins, C-reactive protein, IL-1B and NFkB. While small but statistically significant reductions in CRP levels were seen 48 hours after the second session in the Avenanthramide group compared to the control group (3% lower CRP levels (0.266 vs. 0.274 milligrams/deciliter, p < 0.05)), much greater reductions were seen in IL-1B levels at rest (53.2% lower levels (0.75 vs. 1.6 pictograms/milliliter, p < 0.05)) and 24 hours after the second treadmill session (45.8% lower IL-1B levels 0.95 vs. 1.75 pg/mL, p < 0.05)).
Finally, those in the Avenanthramide group had 24.4% lower levels of “binding activity” of NFkB before the second session started (0.9 vs. 1.19 arbitrary units, p ), 29.1% lower levels 24 hours after the second session (0.78 vs. 1.1 arbitrary units, p < 0.05) and 41.2% lower levels 48 hours after the second session (0.7 vs. 1.19 arbitrary units, p < 0.05).
For the researchers, “High levels of dietary avenanthramide significantly decreased systemic inflammatory response of the older women to downhill walking” and that “dietary supplementation of avenanthramide at the given dose appeared to be a useful dietary supplement in reducing inflammation after demanding physical exercise.”
Source: Koenig, Ryan, et al. “Avenanthramide supplementation attenuates exercise-induced inflammation in postmenopausal women.” Nutrition journal 13.1 (2014): 21.
© 2014 Koenig et al.; licensee BioMed Central Ltd. Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly credited.
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Posted May 13, 2014.
Greg Arnold is a Chiropractic Physician practicing in Hauppauge, NY. You can contact Dr. Arnold directly by emailing him at PitchingDoc@msn.com or visiting his web site at www.PitchingDoc.com
References:
- Peterson DM: Oat antioxidants. J Cereal Sci 2001, 33:115–129
- Collins FW: Oat phenolics: Avenanthramides, novel substituted N-cinnamoylanthranilate alkaloids from oat groats and hulls. J Agric Food Chem 1989, 37:60–66.
- Peterson DM, Hahn MJ, Emmons CL: Oat avenanthramides exhibit antioxidant activities in vitro. Food Chem 2002, 79:473–478
- Liu L, Zubik L, Collins FW, Marko M, Meydani M: The antiatherogenic potential of oat phenolic compounds. Atherosclerosis 2004, 175:39–49
- Koenig R. Avenanthramide supplementation attenuates exercise-induced inflammation in postmenopausal women. Nutr J 2014 Mar 19;13:21. doi: 10.1186/1475-2891-13-21.
