medical advice
Q: When you donate
blood and you are a
ketone burner, do you
need to eat the cookie
to replace ‘glucose’?
A: When you are a ketone
burner it means you already
have low glucose levels in
your blood, so your body
breaks down fat to form
ketones. Our bodies can
use ketones as an energy
source in the absence of
glucose. When you donate
blood you don’t need to
take in any carbs, such
as the cookie, to replace
glucose. You can just drink
water to replace the lost
volume and leave it to your
body to regulate itself.Q: My son, who is
13 and very sporty,
suffers from asthma.
He really suffers when
there is a lot of pollen
in the air. I know I
should change his diet
but I don’t know where
to start.
A: There are many causes
for asthma. Triggers such as
pollen, house dust, infection
or exercise can lead to
the release of chemicals in
the lungs. This will cause
contraction of muscles
in the airways, as well asinflammation, which then
leads to an asthma attack.
With a low-carb,
healthy-fat lifestyle there
is much less inflammation
in the body and many
people on this diet testify
to an improvement in their
asthma and other allergies.
My advice would be to
change your son’s diet to a
low-carb or Paleo diet and
experiment with excluding
specific food types to see
how it impacts his health.Q: I know it is
important to avoid
sugar, but can I use
a ‘natural’ sugar such
as honey or fruit
juice to add sweetness
to dishes?
A: When analysing the
nutritional value of 100g
honey we find it contains
82.4g carbohydrates, of
which 82.12g is sugar
(about 41% fructose, 36%
glucose, 1% maltose and
1% sucrose). 100g of grape
juice contains 14.2g of
sugar (about 7% glucose,
7% fructose, and a minimal
amount of sucrose),
while 100g of apple juice
contains 9.62g of sugar
(about 6% fructose, 3%
glucose and 1% sucrose).To compare, there is 10.6g
of sugar (sucrose) in 100g
of Coca-Cola.
Unfortunately, the
human body reacts in the
same way to the ‘natural’
sugars in honey and fruit
as it does to the so-called
‘unnatural’ sugar in soft
drinks and processed food.
Research suggests that
fructose may be a cause
of insulin resistance; high
blood glucose, of course,
leads to insulin resistance;
and sucrose, which is a
50% mix of glucose and
fructose, can lead to an
unhealthy increase in blood
sugar levels – and it causes
tooth decay.Q: Am I allowed to
eat low-GI bread?
A: Low GI is not the same
as low carb. Low GI means
that the sugar chains in
the food take longer to be
dismantled into smaller
particles (monosaccharides)
to be absorbed, and the
delayed absorption process
means you won’t have
the same high-blood-
sugar spikes as when you
eat high-GI food. As an
example, a banana contains
a large number of carbs but
has a low GI rating.Q
&
A
WITH DR SCHOONBEE
‘When you donate blood and you are
a ketone burner, do you need to eat
the cookie to replace “glucose”?’AND 3 OTHER READER QUESTIONS
FOR DR SCHOONBEE