Diabetes is a health issue that affects many Canadians. According to the Canadian Diabetes Association, more than 20 people are newly diagnosed with the disease every hour of every day. At Sunnybrook’s latest Speaker Series, Your Role In Managing Diabetes, a leading panel of experts discussed the important role patients play in living well with type 2 diabetes.
Most people may think they know what food is, but what makes it so? Is it the calories and nutrients it contains? How then do you categorize items with no calories or nutrients? At the diabetes Speaker Series, registered dietitian Annie Hoang challenged attendees to consider their thoughts on the topic during a thoughtful presentation. She quoted from food journalist Michael Pollan, who has written about “real food” versus “edible food-like substances”.
When it comes to living with diabetes, Hoang says it’s important to eat “real food”. She says all of the diets recommended by the Canadian Diabetes Association advocate vegetables and fruits, whole grains, legumes, nuts and seeds, as well as dairy and lean meats in moderation. Some of the healthiest options available, particularly in the produce aisle, don’t even contain a nutrition label.
To have lasting impact, Hoang says it’s important to incorporate dietary changes you can stick to in the long term. Healthy swaps will only offer benefit if they can be sustained. While the issue of food and nutrition is a vast one, Hoang cited another quote from Pollan to put things into perspective: “Eat food, mostly plants, not too much.” Seven simple words to live by.
