Diet soda ups risk of stroke, heart attack--study

The truth about the hazards of diet soda is that people feel they can drink high amounts of the zero calorie beverages without jeopardizing their health.

Dr. Jana Klauer, a New York City-based private practice physician specializing in weight control and nutrition, stated, "The study highlights the increasingly negative information we are getting about the consumption of non-caloric sweetened beverages.

"People drink them to save calories and enjoy a sweet taste, but diet soda hasn't lead to weight loss and now appears to be causing more problems than it solves."

Study details
In a bid to examine whether diet soda drinkers enhance their risk of having a stroke, heart attack and other vascular events such as blood clots in the limbs, the researchers conducted a study.

They enrolled 2,564 adults with an average age of 69 years in upper Manhattan from 1993 to 2001 through random phone calls.

Half the participants were Hispanic, 24 percent were black, and 21 percent white.

All the participants were questioned about their diets and soda consumption at the onset of the study.

Additionally, they underwent medical check-ups including blood pressure measurements and blood tests for cholesterol levels. Their health was tracked for nearly a decade.

“This study suggests that diet soda is not an optimal substitute for sugar-sweetened beverages, and may be associated with a greater risk of stroke.”--lead researcher Hannah Gardener, an epidemiologist at the University of Miami Miller School of Medicine

Revelations of the study
During the study period, 559 volunteers suffered heart attacks including strokes and 338 of these events were fatal.

The researchers found that after factoring age, smoking and alcohol intake, people who drank diet soda daily had a 61 percent higher risk of cardiovascular problems compared to those who did not drink any soda at all.

Even after taking into account the medical history of metabolicsyndrome, peripheral vascular disease, and heart disease, the incidence of stroke was still 48 percent higher among diet soda drinkers.

Hannah Gardener, an epidemiologist at the University of Miami Miller School of Medicine and lead researcher on the project, stated, “This study suggests that diet soda is not an optimal substitute for sugar-sweetened beverages, and may be associated with a greater risk of stroke.”

Need for more research
Though the study found a strong link between diet soda and stroke risk, the reasons for the co-relation are ambiguous.

Experts feel there is need for further research to substantiate the findings.

“I think diet soda drinkers need to stay tuned,” Gardener said. “I don’t think that anyone should be changing their behaviors based on one study. Hopefully this will motivate other researchers to do more studies.”

The findings of the study were presented Wednesday at the American Stroke Association International Stroke Conference in Los Angeles.