Understand Glycemic Index and Glycemic Load: 5 Key Principles for Better Blood Sugar Control

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Managing blood sugar levels is crucial for overall health, especially for those with diabetes or prediabetes. Two important concepts to understand to manage health and wellbeing when making food choices especially if you want to manage diabetes are the Glycemic Index (GI) and Glycemic Load (GL). Here are five principles to help you make better food choices based on these concepts: 1. Prioritize Low Glycemic Index Foods The Glycemic Index (GI) measures how quickly a food raises blood sugar levels. Foods with a low GI cause a slower, more gradual rise in blood sugar, which is beneficial for maintaining stable energy levels and avoiding spikes. Examples of low GI foods include non-starchy vegetables, beans, and certain fruits like apples, pears, pomegranate and berries. 2. Consider Glycemic Load for a Comprehensive View Glycemic Load (GL) takes into account both the quality (GI) and quantity of carbohydrates in a food. This provides a more comprehensive understanding of a food’s impact on...

Health Guide to water handling and storage

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Pure drinking water is one of the primary needs of human beings, but even after getting it, one needs to take care into handling this pure water so that it remains pure without any germs and thus consumed safe. Here in the article we discuss, quick health guide to water handling and storage.

Cleaning water storage bottle or vessel is important because bacteria relish dark, moist areas and water bottle or storage vessel is their suitable place if they are not disinfected correctly every few days.

Most odor and taste problems occur when bottles are stored in wet areas or kept sealed for long periods of time with liquid inside. Polyethylene bottles can also develop unpleasant tastes/odors when they’re used to store a variety of acidic juices.

Easy Clean :

  • The easy way to maintain any plastic water bottle or bag or vessel is to rinse it out after each use and to let it air dry completely.

Washing reusable water bottles or vessel :

  • Wash the water bottle daily with soap and warm water. Rinse with clear water, and drain thoroughly. Allow the water bottle to dry thoroughly overnight.
  • If you don’t have a sink handy in your office, store the water bottle in a refrigerator at the end of the day so that germs won’t grow overnight.

Sanitizing reusable water bottles or vessel :

  • Sanitize with a dilute bleach solution by rinsing the inside of the bottle with a dilute bleach solution. Use 1 teaspoon bleach per quart of water. Allow the bottle to thoroughly air-dry after washing and sanitizing.
  • At least once a week, follow the washing and rinsing with a sanitizing step.

Use and Throw plastic water bottles :

  • Clear plastic bottles that are filled with water or juice and purchased at the grocery or market are not designed to be reused.
  • The plastic used to manufacture single-use soft-drink and water bottles, polyethylene terephthalate (PET), generally does not break over time but a recent study suggested that washing this type of water bottle to clean the inside and remove germs might accelerate the break-down of the plastic, potentially causing harmful chemicals to leach into the water.
  • So while it may be tempting to refill this type of water bottle, it’s really best to recycle the bottle when you are done.

Plastic beverage containers :

Thick plastic beverage containers, are composed of a sturdier plastic than the single-use bottles and can be reused. However, care still needs to be taken in properly cleaning and handling these containers.

Note: Do read carefully, the instructions label written on the commercial products including water bottles for any particular safety guideline.  Stay safe!

References and Further Reading :

  1. Center for Disease Control and Prevention, http://www.cdc.gov/healthywater/drinking/bottled/
  2. National Resource Defence Council, http://www.nrdc.org/water/drinking/qbw.asp
  3. http://www.bottledwater.org/health
  4. http://www.rei.com/learn/expert-advice/cleaning-water-bottles.html