Professor Tim Spector has warned that choosing the right kind of oats is crucial. The small superfoods have been found to have beneficial effects including lowering your cholesterol, improving blood sugar levels and reducing blood pressure.
However, the type of oats you buy matters, as some ultra-processed varieties sold in supermarkets may be stripped of their beneficial nutrients. The co-founder of the health app Zoe took to Instagram to answer a question he claims to get asked frequently – are oats healthy?
Professor Spector said: “Are oats healthy or not? It’s a question I often get asked, and it depends on your own body, how you respond to sugars, and it also depends on which ones you pick.
“So you’ve got sachets of highly refined ground-up ‘instant’ oats that you can make just in a few minutes. And you’ve got the bran with a huge difference in fibre, which means they have a different effect on your body. Studies have shown that if you eat enough oats, you can reduce your blood cholesterol. But you do have to eat a lot of oats to do that.
“And it’s because they contain beta glucan, which ends up lining your intestines to stop those lipids, those blood fats, getting into the system rapidly.”
In the Instagram post, he added that the type of oats you choose can make a difference to their impact on your health.
Professor Spector said: “For gut health, I would recommend higher fibre options such as oat bran (~16g/100g) or whole rolled oats (~10g/100g) to the refined ‘instant’ oats which have less fibre (~3g/100g) and are absorbed more quickly, potentially causing a larger blood sugar response.
“Of course, you can always add extra fat, fibre and protein via your porridge toppings to help mitigate this and slow your blood sugar response, like adding a dollop of Greek yoghurt and a mix of different seeds to your porridge during cooking (which also provides some plant points towards your 30/week). Beta glucan in oats can help reduce blood cholesterol but again, the type of oats you choose matters. While instant oats only contain ~4g of beta glucan per 100g, oat bran contains up to ~10g/100g.
“The final note on this is if you eat oats regularly and it’s accessible to you, I would recommend choosing organic oats as studies have found oats contain 5 to 10x more glyphosate than other grains.”
