Sugar overload can damage heart

A study led by researchers at The University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston (UTHealth) has found that too much sugar can lead to heart failure.

A single small molecule, the glucose metabolite glucose 6-phosphate (G6P), causes stress to the heart that changes the muscle proteins and induces poor pump function leading to heart failure, according to the study.

G6P can accumulate from eating too much starch and/or sugar.

"Treatment is difficult. Physicians can give diuretics to control the fluid, and beta-blockers and ACE inhibitors to lower the stress on the heart and allow it to pump more economically," Heinrich Taegtmeyer, M.D., D.Phil., principal investigator and professor of cardiology at the UTHealth Medical School, said.

"But we still have these terrible statistics and no new treatment for the past 20 years," the researcher said.

Taegtmeyer performed preclinical trials in animal models, as well as tests on tissue taken from patients at the Texas Heart Institute who had a piece of the heart muscle removed in order to implant a left ventricle assist device by O.H. "Bud" Frazier, M.D., and his team.

Both led to the discovery of the damage caused by G6P.

"When the heart muscle is already stressed from high blood pressure or other diseases, and then takes in too much glucose, it adds insult to injury," Taegtmeyer said.

The study is published in the Journal of the American Heart Association.