diabetes

Losing weight in a week with small diet changes

by admin on December 27, 2010

A lot of experts believes that making small changes in the diet as well as lifestyle, can have a great impact on maintain a good and weight and cholesterol levels. Today, I will discuss healthy eating plan that basically involves making small  but significant changes to what you eat, what you do and what you want to achieve. Follow these how to lose weight loss tips.

Good fats

We have taught that we need to cut back on fats to reduce weight, but this is not necessarily correct because there are good fats as well. They are needed to have a good and healthy diet. These fats are called HLD. They can give us Omega – 3 fatty acids, which have been discovered to be good for the heart. Good sources are fish, nuts, and legumes.

Small Sized servings

Another technique you should follow is eating small. Americans are fond of eating on fast food joints and have great tendency to order large or go large meals. This action may be unnoticeable but still this is not a good thing. Having extra simply means extra calories. This means that these would add to your weight and become unwanted fats. In addition to that, several reports said that our meals have recently increased in size. My best advice is to think twice, and take considerations before going large. Start initiating with your small meals, have a small child size of the meals as an example. This is a way to save money as well.

Eat more

Eat more fruits and vegetables; these are the foundation for good health. The suggested servings for fruits and vegetables are five to nine servings per day. It not only reduces weight since they have low calorie level, they also offer nutrients that have been proven to fight cancer, coronary heart illness, diabetes. You can eat fruits as snacks, also as major meals.

These are just simple and easy steps on how to lose 10 pounds in a week, and in the event that you learn how significant this kind of diet is, you also begin your journey to a positive and healthy lifestyle. You’ll be aware of the natural and healthy environment that surrounds you.

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Gestational Diabetes Diet, the Solution to Diabetes in Pregnancy

by admin on July 7, 2010

About gestational diabetes

According to the American Diabetes Association, gestational diabetes is one of the most common types of health problems for pregnant women, occurring in about four percent of all pregnancies. In the United States, about 135,000 women are diagnosed every year with gestational diabetes.

Gestational diabetes develops in stages, often becoming identifiable around weeks 24 to 28 of the pregnancy, when it is often routinely screened for. However, the condition can develop much earlier, some women are automatically at a higher risk if they have a family history of other forms of diabetes or if the have had gestational diabetes during a previous pregnancy. Also, being significantly overweight increases the risk of diabetes.

The onset of gestational diabetes is related to hormonal activities that occur as the baby develops in the mother’s body. It is believed that hormones, produced during pregnancy, interfere with the activities of insulin, a different hormone that is needed to aid the mother’s cells to take glucose from her blood for use in the normal chemical actions that take place in cells. This is sometimes referred to as glucose intolerance or insulin resistance. In most cases, the mother-to-be can compensate for the increased glucose levels by producing more insulin to overcome the resistance. But that is not always the case.

In those fewer situations when the glucose cannot be taken up by the cells, it remains in the blood, accumulating to the above normal levels that characterize diabetes, an unhealthy and potentially dangerous condition if not taken care of, which fortunately, is not difficult to do.

The usual treatment involves diet and exercise and in some cases, if diet and exercise are shown to be inadequate, medications or insulin may be prescribed. The objective is to control the blood sugars levels and keep them from rising too far above normal.

Diet makes a difference
Some foods, especially those categorized as simple carbohydrates, are essentially sugars that are absorbed into the bloodstream and quickly cause elevated blood glucose levels. Those types of food items include the sweet and sugary snacks and desserts, cookies, cakes, pies, and soft drinks and such and those will need to be avoided to minimize the blood sugar problems.

In all cases, good nutrition is important during pregnancy. To deal with gestational diabetes, a dietitian, or other member of the healthcare team, will devise a personalized gestational diabetes diet that meets the nutritional requirements of mother and growing baby and also incorporates personal food tastes and preferences of the mother.

The special gestational diabetes diet will provide the necessary calories from a balanced source of nutrients that supply the appropriate amounts of carbohydrates, proteins, and fats together with vitamins, minerals, and fluids. The diabetes diet plan will also focus on managing weight gain to keep it within acceptable limits.

Problems arise from failure to lower blood sugars
Without the implementation of a gestational diabetes diet routine to maintain blood glucose within a safe range, new problems may arise. If the blood glucose levels stay high, an increase of insulin production will occur as the body automatically attempts to provide the extra insulin in response to the increased glucose load, and the body of the baby will also produce extra insulin in response to the glucose.

When more unused insulin is present in the baby, it causes more fat to be stored, an added problem because it can result in bigger, fatter babies that may require birth through caesarian section. And another possible problem can arise after the birth because the baby’s increased insulin and the possible continued production of insulin, may cause blood sugar levels in the baby to then fall dangerously low, a condition of hypoglycemia, not as dangerous as the high blood glucose levels of diabetes but something that must be dealt with promptly.

To do so will probably require breast-feeding of the baby within half an hour of birth or maybe a drip feed of sugar solution into the baby’s vein.

In conclusion
Whatever situations arise from gestational diabetes during pregnancy, its management, treatment, and control are well established medical procedures. Through the supervision and monitoring of the doctor and supporting healthcare team, the outcome will be a successful pregnancy, ending with the joy of a healthy new baby.

When the baby is born, In most cases the gestational diabetes ends.

For more information on the above topic please check out Gestational Diabetes Diet and also Diabetic Menu Guide for this and other related topics.

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Diabetes and Low Carb Foods

by admin on July 1, 2010

Diabetes is a chronic disease characterized by higher than normal levels of glucose circulating in the bloodstream of a person due to an impairment of their body’s normally efficient system to control and regulate the blood sugar levels.

Type-2 is the most prevalent form of diabetes accounting for about 90 percent of all cases and is being diagnosed increasingly in North America. Type-2 is closely linked to the parallel growth of obesity and overweight in our citizens, both adults and children. It is a disease that is increasing because of what we eat, how much we eat, and how little we exercise. It seems too simple to think that the onset of diabetes can be avoided by an alteration of eating habits and by becoming more physically active, but that is the case. And for those who already have been diagnosed as having diabetes, the same change in lifestyle can moderate the ultimately serious effects of higher blood sugar levels.

How can diet be changed?
The diet can be changed most obviously in three ways for sure. One way is to cut out or cut down on the bad foods we eat, another is to incorporate better food items into the daily dietary routines and the third is to avoid eating more than is needed to provide the body with enough calories to sustain the energy output of the day’s activities and physical exertions.

A key component in a diet for diabetics is the amounts and types of carbohydrates (carbs for short). Carbs are the main source of the sugars in the blood and some carbs deliver far more sugar than others and some foods are dense in the amount of carbs they contain while others are less so. So again, it is fairly obvious where the choices should lie if we can find out which food items are nutritious without delivering too quickly a sugar boost.

Carbs are basically chains of sugar molecules that can include simple sugars, starches and fiber. The simple sugars breakdown more swiftly than the more complex starches, the fiber is indigestible but provides roughage.

To explain the process in very simplistic terms, the food that is eaten descends to the stomach where it is digested and broken down into its nutrient constituents. Those are the proteins, carbohydrates, fats, water, vitamins and minerals that then passes through the walls of the intestines into the bloodstream for delivery throughout the body to various needy cells that use the nutrients. The speed at which the nutrient molecules can enter the blood stream depends on the complexity of their chemical structures, the more complex, the longer it takes. Carbohydrates can be simple or complex in that regard, so the preferred carbs are the complex carbs that take longer to break down than the simple carbs.

For people with diabetes, a nutritious diet that emphasizes the inclusion of low carb foods can have a positive impact on their blood sugar levels. Low carb foods, as their name suggests, do not deliver too much sugar too quickly to the blood stream.

Some quality foods for the diabetic diet that have few or no carbs include fish, lean meats and poultry, cheese, fruits, nuts, and vegetables.

Include foods that rank low on the glycemic index
The Glycemic Index (GI) is a listing of everyday carb containing foods that are numerically ranked for their speed in entering the bloodstream after being digested. Glucose is ranked at 100. By checking with the glycemic index we can soon become familiar with the foods that release glucose more slowly, some that take several hours, enabling a closer to normal blood sugar level.

Glycemic rankings are a valuable guide to choosing the right food items. Without needing to buy the book listing thousands of food items, try to obtain a partial copy of the glycemic index and its companion, the glycemic load, or perhaps make note of index values that appear in newspaper and magazine articles or check out the local public library. And the internet has hundreds of sources listed relating to the glycemic index and glycemic load.

Foods with rankings up to 55 are considered low
Foods that are ranked from 56 to 70 are high
Foods that are ranked over 70 are high.

Healthy eating is not always easy but when possible, avoid the high glycemic index ranked foods. For instance, instead of white breads (GI = 70), choose whole grain breads (GI = 50), avoid the sugary cereals and go for the whole grain cereals. And eliminate from your beverage list the soft drinks and colas that have lots of sugars in them.

Where possible look for the low carb foods. Learn to read the contents labels that are on most packaged foods. Be wary if the first few ingredients listed are sugar, sucrose, or fructose corn syrup, they will contribute to spikes in blood sugar.

For more information on this topic, including more detailed explanation of the glycemic index, please check out the following links: Diabetic Food List Plus and Low Carb Foods.

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Diabetic Socks Benefits

March 29, 2010

Not the most exciting subject in the world unless you have diabetes, then diabetic socks become an important accessory to have.. Due to the increase of diabetics in recent times protecting parts of your body, such as your feet, becomes more important. Diabetes can create poor circulation which causes loss of feeling in your feet. [...]

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Diabetes and Meal Planning

February 9, 2010

As a diabetic myself, I know the importance of good, effective meal planning. If you do not know, people who have diabetes have to monitor what they eat by watching which foods they eat and checking blood sugar levels. I learned about how food affects my body and which foods are OK to eat for [...]

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