Q. Explain about Food Exchange System?
In a diabetic's day to day diet, the calorie intake and the quantity of food consumed should not have wide fluctuations. Also the diet should not get monotonous and I-igid pressurizing the patient to take the same foods day in and day out. Variety in foods makes life more interesting. Don't you think so? For this reason we have the fixed exchange system which provides almost the same amount of calories, carbohydrates, proteins and fats grouped together. By this we keep the total intake of nutrients constant but at the same time provide variety in foods. Thus there may be difference in the weight of the food which provides the constant nutrients.
Is this not interesting? If we how the total exchanges of milk we have to take in a day, we can have a number of choices of milk alternatives which we can substitute for milk giving us the same nutritive content. Occasionally, we could have curds, buttermilk, cow's milk, even cheese, khoa or. Skimmed milk, in we want to. So if we can educate the diabetics regarding all exchanges of food groups they can play with their diet themselves. Exchanges for vegetables, fruits, cereals, pulses, meat or fats have similarly been worked out. Each exchange list will provide a number of items that can be exchanged within the group or with each food group.