Effect of Ingestion of Rare Sugar Syrup on the Blood Glucose Response in Humans

Abstract

We investigated the effects of rare sugar syrup (RSS) on the blood glucose response. First, we determined the glycemic index (GI) of RSS in a randomized single-blind crossover study involving 10 healthy subjects (age 32.5±1.8 y) , and found that its value was 49. Second, we examined the effects of RSS on the postprandial glycemic response in a randomized placebo-control, double-blind crossover study involving 50 healthy subjects, some of whom had borderline diabetes (age 47.1±1.4 y) . Sucrose, which contains the same amount of glucose as RSS, was used as a control. Sucrose and RSS were dissolved in 150 mL of coffee. Blood was collected at 6 time-points over 120 min. We found that RSS showed a significantly greater reduction in the 120-min AUC of both blood glucose and insulin compared to the control. This study demonstrated that RSS is a low GI sweetener that elicits a significantly lower glycemic response than sucrose in humans. A second study has been approved by the institutional ethics committee, and is registered in the clinical trial registration system UMIN-CTR (UMIN000018120) .