Diet and Health FAQ

Tagged As: Diabetic Diet Guidelines

Question:
I'm attempting to find heart healthy and diabetic friendly guildlines in the form of recommended daily nutritional values (e.g. fat, saturated far, fibre etc.). The guildlines must be from an authoratative source. Also, is there a resource where I can find a definition of what is considered a Good Source of Fibre, or Reduced/Low Sodium? Does anyone know where I may find such information? Any help would be greatly appreciated

Answer:
Peoples response to diet wrt to heart disease may be slightly different depending upon the underlying metabolic problems reflected in a Berkeley Blood panel or something similar. Check out Robert Superko's book Before the Heart Attacks where he has slightly different amounts of fat/carb/protein based on your lipid profile, particle sizes etc. You do not have to have a Berkeley lipid profile done but the book will give you an idea of what some of the issues are. A generally good book on nutrition is probably Walter Willet's Eat drink and be healthy. Most of the recommendations are evidence based and the useful thing is that the base of his pyramid starts with exercise. As a heart patient you will be advised to go on a low fat diet by some sources and a good book examining why this might not be a good idea for some people is Low fat lies, High fat frauds by Kevin Vigilante. If you do not want to obsess just control the amount of food you eat (try for a small energy deficit) and exercise. Combine this with trying to eliminate as much saturated & trans fat and substitute with mono unsaturated like olive and canola oil.