DIGESTIBILITY OF CARBOHYDRATES FROM RICE-BASED, OAT-BASED AND WHEAT-BASED READY-TO-EAT BREAKFAST CEREALS IN CHILDREN

Objective: To study the effect of the presence and quality of dietary fibre in ready-to-eat (RTE) breakfast cereals on completeness of carbo hydrate digestion in children and on starch susceptibility to alpha-am ylase in vitro. Design: A controlled intervention study. Subjects: Eig ht 3-8-year-old healthy children. Interventions: Completeness of diges tion was evaluated by assessing the amount of carbohydrates apparently fermented into the colon using the breath-H-2 technique after consump tion in random order, of five breakfast tests containing boiled rice ( either alone or supplemented with 3 g of lactulose) as reference food, or RTE cereals based on rice (low-fibre), wheat (high insoluble fibre ) and oats (high-soluble fibre). The potential glycaemic impact of the products was estimated in vitro by assessing starch susceptibility to alpha-amylolysis using an enzymatic-dialysis method. Results: Compare d to boiled rice and to rice-based RTE cereal, wheat- and oat-based RT E cereals both significantly (P < 0.05) increased the amount of appare ntly fermented carbohydrates (+1.1 +/- 1.7% of total breakfast carbohy drate fermented for rice, +5.6 +/- 0.9% for wheat and +9.4 +/- 3.7% fo r oats; mean +/- SEM), calculated using the excess H-2 in breath after lactulose as standard. All products showed similar in vitro digestibi lity, resulting in estimated glycaemic indexes of 117.5 (24.0) for ric e, and 105.7 (14.1) for oats-based, 128.4 (17.6) for wheat-based, and 129.8 (16.6) [mean 95% CI)] for rice-based RTE cereals. Conclusions: R esults suggest that the presence of fibre in RTE breakfast cereals, in particular soluble fibre, increases colonic fermentation in children whereas it seems not to affect glucose availability. Sponsorship: Gran t No. 93.00599.PF41 from the National Research Council (CNR - Targeted Project 'Prevention and Control of Disease Factors') Subproject 'Alim entazione'. Descriptors: carbohydrate, children, colonic fermentation, dietary fibre, digestibility, ready-to-eat breakfast cereals