Diet For Type 1 Diabetes

Calculating the amount of carbohydrates in the diet of patients with type 1 diabetes depends on their skill to organise their diet and to control blood sugar levels. This practice offers freedom to eat and confidence with controlling diabetes.

It’s recommended to calculate how many carbohydrates, a patient suffering from type 1 diabetes eats during a meal, because this helps to adjust the insulin dosage and maintain normal blood sugar levels.

Carbohydrates are the most important source of energy for the organism and all types of carbohydrates determine the increase or decrease of blood sugar. It’s very important to calculate each gram of carbohydrates during a meal and the amount of insulin that should be taken after a meal is different for each person, depending on the amount of carbohydrates the meal contained and the blood sugar levels after it.

Aliments which are rich in carbohydrates are fruit and veggies, milk, yoghurt, wheat products (such as bread, cereal, potatoes and corn) and sweets (candy and cake). Aliments which contain sugar usually have more carbohydrates than aliments containing starch. Contrary to what is believed, people who suffer from diabetes can, in fact, eat aliments containing sugar. However, if the diet consists of mainly the aliments rich in carbohydrates, it is likely that the person on this diet isn’t eating enough aliments which are better as far as nutrition goes.

It’s very, very important to know EXACTLY how many carbohydrates each aliment contains. Useful tips to measure carbohydrate intake are: reading the labels on each aliment, whether in a box or a can, constantly checking blood sugar levels before any meal and at 1 p.m. (this helps the patient with type 1 diabetes understand how aliments influence blood sugar levels) and keeping a blood sugar values notebook, where the time of meals and snacks, the amount of carbohydrates for each meal and snack and, of course, blood sugar levels should be written down (this helps when adjustments have to be made).

Although there is information about the amount of carbohydrates in each aliment in books, it’s vital to visit a nutritionist (this helps the patient and the doctor to establish individual needs and diet and to understand how many meals the person suffering from type 1 diabetes should have daily, when to have them and the total amount of carbohydrates in meals). In case the patient has any questions regarding the diet, the doctor should be contacted. In case there are problems with measuring carbohydrates or planning meals, again, the doctor should be contacted.