Grape-enriched diet could help protect you from getting blind

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Researchers have said that a grape enriched diet could help protect your retina's structure and function, preventing it from deterioration which can cause blindness.

The University of Miami, Bascom Palmer Eye Institute investigated if a diet supplemented with grapes could protect the photoreceptors in mice with retinal degeneration, where the mice were either fed a grape-supplemented diet corresponding to 3 servings of grapes per day for humans or one of two control diets.

The results showed that retinal function was significantly protected in the mice consuming the grape-enriched diet, exhibiting thicker retinas and the consumption also protected retinal function in an oxidative stress model of macular degeneration.

Further analysis revealed that the grape diet resulted in lower levels of inflammatory proteins and higher amounts of protective proteins in the retinas.

Dr. Abigail Hackam, lead investigator of the study said that the grape-enriched diet provided substantial protection of retinal function and it appears that grapes may work in multiple ways to promote eye health from signaling changes at the cellular level to directly countering oxidative stress.

The study was presented at the Association for Research in Vision and Ophthalmology conference in Orlando, Florida.