Assessment of hormonal and metabolic effects of dietary fiber in young Thai women.

Objective: To investigate whether daily dietary fiber intake at the reference level has any impact on studied hormones in a population of Thai women.

Material And Method: Twenty-eight healthy Thai women (aged 18-20 years, BMI 18.5-25 kg/m2) with a history of regular menstrual cycles committed themselves to prepared food without changing the usual ratio of three major macronutrients. Dietary fiber from natural source at the amount of 8-10 g/day equal to their regular consumption was added to their daily diet for one menstrual cycle, then, increased to be 25-30 g/day for another 2 successive cycles. A single blood sample on midluteal day (day 18-23) was obtained in all three cycles. Plasma luteinizing hormone, follicle stimulating hormone, prolactin, estradiol, progesterone, cortisol, and insulin together with total cholesterol, high-density lipoprotein cholesterol, low-density lipoprotein cholesterol, and triglycerides were analyzed.

Results: The measured hormones and lipids did not change significantly when compared between a control and two experimental cycles (p > 0.05).

Conclusion: Short-term consumption of 25-30 g/day fiber diet as recommended by the Reference Daily Intake (RDI) in a Thai population did not alter the studied hormones and lipids thus did not create any health problems.