Diet For Diabetes

Diabetes is the kind of condition that is directly proportional to food consumption. Food can alleviate or aggravate diabetes, thus the best way to prevent and ease this illness is to change and get a proper diet for diabetes.

Patients diagnosed with diabetes are given advice for effective management of the disease and appropriate diet.

Educational advice from a dietitian can be given in order to provide knowledge of healthy eating, to encourage changing of lifestyle, to reduce obesity chances and ensure optimal weight management. Advice will also be given to maintain blood glucose and lipid levels as close to normal as possible and to reduce acute complication of diabetes.

Educating patients about their illness is the best way to achieve independence in managing their condition. Self education is important because the doctor can not watch what you do and eat on a daily basis. Self-awareness and knowledge about this illness is the best way to fight it. And only through proper diet for diabetes can the patient have the chance to cure the illness and prevent it from reoccurring.

A diet plan is given to the patient according to the amount of daily calories needed to maintain sugar levels as close to normal as possible. To do this the patient must eat about the same amount of food each day, exercise and take their medicine the same time each day.

Diabetics need to be careful about their food choices, like starches, vegetables, fruits, meat, milk and yogurt. And must limit the amounts of fats and sweets eaten everyday.

Sample diet plan for a patient with 1,200 – 1,600 calories:

This plan is best for a small woman who exercises, a small or medium woman who wants to lose weight and a medium woman who does not exercise much.

Choices of foods and serving every day:
– 6 starches
– 2 milk and yogurt
– 3 vegetables
– 2 meat or meat substitute
– 2 fruits
– 3 fats maximum

In general, a diabetic patient may have 2 to 5 choices of carbohydrates (60 grams max.) 1 choice of protein, and a certain amount of fats. Talk to your dietitian for specific kinds of food.

Carbohydrates – fruits, vegetables, beans, dairy and starchy foods like bread. Try fresh fruits rather than canned fruits, condiments like non-fat mayonnaise, ketchup and mustard.

Proteins – meat, poultry, fish, dairy products, beans and some vegetables. Best to eat poultry and fish more often than red meat. Do not eat poultry skin and trim extra fat from meat. Choose non-fat or low-fat cheese and yogurt.

Fats – butter, margarine, lard and oils add fat to foods. Dairy products also have some level amount of fats too. Avoid fried foods, egg yolks, bacon and high-fat dairy products.