Special Diets

Celiac Disease and Ketogenic Diet

What is Celiac Disease?

Celiac disease (CD) is a genetic disorder. In people with CD, eating certain types of protein, called gluten, sets off an autoimmune response that causes damage to the small intestine. This, in turn, causes the small intestine to lose its ability to absorb the nutrients found in food, leading to malnutrition and a variety of other com-plications. Eventually, decreased absorption of nutrients can cause vitamin deficiencies that deprive your brain, peripheral nervous system, bones, liver and other organs of vital nourishment, which can lead to other illnesses. This is especially serious in children, who need proper nutrition to develop and grow. The offending protein, gluten, is found in wheat, barley, rye, and to a lesser extent, oats. No treatment can cure celiac disease. However, you can effectively manage celiac disease through changing your diet.

What can I do?

Read food labels – Food labels are your lifeline to better health. Always read the food label before you purchase any product. Some foods that may appear acceptable, such as rice or corn cereals, may contain gluten. What’s more, a manufacturer may change a product’s ingredients at any time. In July 2004, the U.S. Congress passed a bill requiring products containing wheat, milk, soy, peanuts, tree nuts, fish, shellfish or eggs to say so in plain English on the product’s label. The bill also requires the FDA to develop a standard definition of “gluten- free” to make it easier for shoppers with celiac disease to identify products. Call the manufacturer. If you can’t tell by the label if a food contains gluten, don’t eat it until you check with the product’s manufacturer.

Ketogenic Diet

The ketogenic diet is based on the principle that by depleting the body of carbohydrates, which are its primary source of energy, you can force the body to burn fat for fuel, thereby maximizing weight loss. When you consume foods that contain carbohydrates, the body converts those carbohydrates into glucose, or blood sugar, which it then uses for energy. Because glucose is the simplest form of energy for the body to use, it’s always used for energy before your body turns to stored fat for fuel. On a ketogenic diet, the goal is to restrict carbohydrate intake so that the body must break down fat for energy. When this occurs, fat is broken down in the liver, thereby producing ketones, which are by-products of your metabolism. These ketones are then used to fuel the body in the absence of glucose.

How Do You Follow A Ketogenic Diet?

There are several types of the keto diet, but essentially, to achieve a state of ketosis, you have to severely reduce the amount of carbs you eat. (You can use this ketogenic calculator to create a custom food plan.) Data suggest the average American man over age 20 consumes 47.4 percent of his daily calories from carbs, and the average American woman over age 20 consumes 49.6 percent of her daily calories from carbs. (3) But in the classic ketogenic diet, which was originally used for the management of seizure disorders, 80 to 90 percent of calories come from fat, 5 to 15 percent come from protein, and 5 to 10 percent come from carbohydrates.

A modified version of the ketogenic diet, which allows you to eat protein more liberally — at 20 to 30 percent of your total calories — with the same carbohydrate restriction, is the more commonly used version of the diet today. Some of the aims of the latest version of the ketogenic diet are weight loss, weight management, and improved athletic performance.

Information borrowed from www.healthline.com

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