Once again the Digestive Disease Consultants of Orlando welcome you to our new blog here at our newly designed website. We hope you will take a moment to get acquainted with us through our previous blog. It’s a guided tour of our site for our website visitors and readers, as well as our patients. Our blog will regularly bring you the hottest digestive news and research articles, plus treatment information and human interest stories.
The Healthy Care and Feeding of Your Digestive Tract
Let us begin this year’s blogging stories with a quote from Hippocrates, the ancient Greek physician who developed the oath doctors still take. He stated, “Let food be thy medicine and medicine be thy food.”
Common Sense: Careful food choices can result in a healthy digestive tract.
Considering these words, the ancient Greek physician would totally understand the 21st century fascination with nutrition and diets. Diet advice abounds in books, television programs and online articles. Even thousands of years ago, physicians understood the key relationship between what we eat and how our digestive tract feels and functions.
In the words of the famous Mayo Clinic, a diet for a healthy digestive tract “includes a variety of foods from the major food groups: fruits; vegetables; whole grains; low-fat dairy products and lean protein, including beans and other legumes, nuts and seeds; and healthy fats.”
Four Classic Digestive Tract Facts Behind the Food
Were he to visit our time, Hippocrates might not understand how proper food choices have devolved into fads and trends.
He would be fascinated by our access to healthy advice and our copious food supply. But he would find it incomprehensible, and illogical, that Americans choose to consume excess salt, sugar, chemicals and preservatives.
Let’s take a look at four of our top eight classic facts about healthy eating and your digestive tract.
Digestive Tract Awareness–Healthy Eating Classic Fact 1:
Discuss your diet with your doctor! We advise you to talk to your doctor if you are having digestive issues. Do not self-diagnose.
It is tempting to use online articles and the advice of friends instead of talking to a healthcare professional. This is unwise. If you are having digestive problems or before you change your diet, discuss your situation with your doctor. Our blog never intends to replace discussion with your doctor.
Experts tell us “Some medications or medical problems can interfere with smooth digestion. If you’ve ruled out other problems but still have symptoms, tell your doctor what’s been going on.”
Our Hint: Take a list of medicines with you. Be sure you include any prescription, over the counter drugs, and supplements you frequently use. These could be critical to your diagnosis. In this week’s article, the Doctors and staff at Orlando Digestive Disease Consultants present you with four classic habits for the care and feeding of a healthy digestive system.
Classic Fact 2: Breakfast of Champions
Eating healthy foods promotes smooth digestion, but know your food sensitivities.
Eating breakfast is a common sense habit. Recently, consuming calories earlier in the day has been spot-lighted by dieters, and cleverly termed “front-loading” calories.
Even a small healthy breakfast will help you curb cravings and control your calories as you continue your day. We recommend you design breakfast around two food groups. Suggestions include combinations of yogurt or other dairy, fruit, whole grains and lean proteins in any combination.
Classic Fact 3: Forego the Fat
Why would you want to eat something that will slow you down and make you feel uncomfortable? We suggest that you choose foods that limit your fat intake. Sad to say, many fatty foods are very tasty.
Experts tell us that fatty foods “tend to slow down the digestive process, making you more prone to constipation.”
If you want to eat a diet for a healthy digestive system, become mindful of the fat content in your food.
Replace fatty ground beef and greasy bacon with lean meats and flakey fish. Likewise, your cooking techniques should not include frying or deep fat-frying anything edible.
Classic Fact Number Four: Water (With or Without Lemon) is Great for Your Digestive Tract!
If you look at any restaurant at noon, you are likely to see a great many people drinking lemon water with their meal. This has become a fashionable choice. Our fourth Healthy Eating Classic Fact is that water is the best beverage you can choose, before, during, after or in between your meals. Water aids your digestion as well as your general good health.
(Hippocrates would be shocked we would feel compelled to tell you this. Good, fresh, cold water in his time was more scarce.)
Good water is essential to a healthy digestive system
Vandana Sheth, R.D.E., C.D.E., a spokesperson for the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics, states, “Drinking water is good for you. And if you’re more likely to drink it by adding lemon, go ahead and do so.”
She added, “The added benefits of lemon water include vitamin C, antioxidants and potassium.” Keep in mind, she is not advocating cleansing or fasting with the lemon water, but that is another blog topic.
We thank you for reading the blog at the Orlando Digestive Disease Consultants, and we hope you will make it a habit to stop by our website often. Next week we will bring you four more classic facts behind the care and feeding of your digestive tract.
Then, visit us every seven to ten days throughout the year as we bring you the latest news and research in such hot topics as celiac disease, colon cleanses, IBS, hemorrhoids, probiotics, colorectal cancer, gastroesophageal reflux disease (GERD), and more.