Does the G.I. factor predict the glycaemic effect of a normal serving of food?

Although the G.L is based on 50 gram carbohydrate portions, the ranking of foods is roughly the same when compared on a per usual serving size, per 1000 kilojoule or per 100 gram food basis. There are some exceptions to this, one being carrots. You can eat as many carrots as you wish despite their high G.I.

Studies have shown that even though the G.L factor has been determined on the basis of a 50 gram carbohydrate portion, it can be used to predict the effect of a normal serve size with a meal. This is why the long-term studies of real people with diabetes eating real low G.L meals have been successful.

Would a person with diabetes need to reduce their insulin dose if they changed to low G.I. foods?

It is possible that if a person with well controlled diabetes changes their carbohydrate to low G.I. types that they could reduce their insulin dosage and maintain the same blood sugar levels. While we have heard anecdotes of this occurring, it has not been demonstrated in any scientific studies.

Does the G.I. factor of a food only apply to a certain quantity of the food?

No. The G.I. factor of a food remains the same whether you eat 10 grams of the food or 1000 grams of the food. Because it is a ranking of one carbohydrate food to another according to glycaemic impact, to make the comparison fair, the amount of each food being compared must be the same. This is why a 50 gram (usually) carbohydrate portion of a food is compared to 50 grams of glucose or a 50 gram carbohydrate portion of white bread, when the G.I. factor is being measured. What does change with the quantity of food, is the actual glycaemic effect of that food in the body. We can eat less of a high G.I. food or more of a low G.I. food and end up with the same blood sugar responses.

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There are many different paradigms for exercise, including resistance training, depending on the end goals.

It has been supposed, that the most effective type of resistance training for fat loss would be that requiring aerobic energy use, e.g. Circuit training. Circuit training is the combination of a range of exercises carried out with light weights but with many repetitions to increase aerobic benefit. There seems to be little argument that this form of exercise would have fat burning benefits. Because it also involves muscular resistance, it could additionally provide metabolic benefits if in no other way than in reducing the loss of muscle mass that may occur through diets alone.

The main questions that remain about circuit training are the appropriate duration, intensity and frequency for optimal fat loss. Based on substrate utilisation, it would appear that the intensity should be moderate (i.e. around 40-60 per cent V02 max), and the duration as long as possible. Because many muscle groups are thought to require at least 48 hours to recover from the micro-cellular damage that results from resistance exercises, it would be inadvisable to carry out circuits, at least with high resistance, on a daily basis. Yet significant fat loss requires regular physical activity over long durations, so circuit training should be combined with other aerobic activities, such as walking, at least on every other day, but possibly also on circuit training days.

Metabolic changes due to muscle gain or maintenance might be expected to take two forms. In the first place, if there is a gain in muscle size in resistance-trained obese people, there is likely to be a gain in energy use due to this increase. Several studies have shown an increase in muscle size, or at least a maintenance of muscle mass due to resistance training in obese people, with or without energy restriction. The increased effect on energy use, however, should not be expected to be great.

The second form may be more important, i.e. the reduction in decline of metabolism that would be expected to occur with loss of total body mass due to food restriction. This can amount to between 5-25 per cent within three weeks on a program using diet alone. If this decline is arrested by resistance training, as it has been shown to do with aerobic exercise, it could have a significant impact on total fat loss. However, to date the appropriate research has not been done in this area.

It is important to point out here that because we are talking about increasing, or at least maintaining muscle mass, this is likely to be reflected in weight gain, even though there may be some fat loss. Hence, use of the scales in this instance is definitely contra-indicated. For most obese people an increase in muscle density and weight, irrespective of fat loss, indicates an increase in body size, which is not generally desired by those looking for a decrease in overall body mass. The main question becomes whether it is more time efficient to carry out long, less vigorous, continuous aerobic exercise in the time that might otherwise be used for resistance training.

In the first place, many obese or overfat people by definition have, or are likely to have, reduced muscular efficiency. They are also likely to have decreased cardiovascular function. Hence, sudden intense activity such as resistance training may be both difficult and dangerous. It would not seem prudent, therefore, to put someone on a resistance training program at the outset of any fat loss regime.

Secondly, there is the issue of motivation. Many people have become fat because of their dislike of the traditional forms of exercise which underly weight training. While they may see themselves walking for fat loss, weight training may not be seen as a preferred option. Third, as mentioned above, there is the question of body perception. Finally, frequency of exercise is important. Because resistance training should not be carried out every day (unless a routine is ’split1 i.e. Upper body one day and lower body the next), it would be difficult to get the amount of exercise required (without becoming bored) if resistance training only was used for fat loss.

Having said this, it should be recognised that there may be some individuals, men in particular, who would prefer this type of activity instead of, or in addition to, aerobic activity. If so, they should be encouraged to combine both. Fitness centres can no longer expect to maintain their overfat clientele by programming a limited amount of exercise in the gym on alternate days. Consideration has to be given to the individual carrying out their own routines at times outside the gym setting and this should be supported and monitored by fitness centre personnel.

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Although there are major health consequences of overfatness and obesity, most people who lose body fat through organised diet and exercise plans often regain most of this within a few years; this pattern of weight cycling may continue throughout life. Weight cycling has received much attention in recent times because of reports that it may increase the risks of coronary heart disease. These reports suggest that it may be more dangerous to lose and regain fat in a period of cycles than it is to be permanently fat.

However, evidence for the dangerous effects of weight cycling may have been exaggerated. Reviews of all the research in the area have led Professor Claude Bouchard and Professor Robert Jeffries, both experts in the area of obesity, to conclude that there is no real evidence that weight cycling is more dangerous to health than not reducing body fat. The severity and frequency of cycling may be the important issue to consider here.

Myth-information. ‘Negative calories’ is a term used in some diets to suggest fat burning properties of food. There are no such things as negative calories and no fat burning’ foods.

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Halvah is made from sesame seeds and honey. It has been used in the Orient for thousands of years as a popular candy. Even now, halvah is very popular in the Middle East—in Turkey, Israel-, and the Arabian countries. In ancient Babylon women ate halvah to restore their vitality and sex appeal.

A French doctor’s research a few years ago gave scientific support to the old folklore. Sesame seeds have been found to be rich in the minerals magnesium and potassium, and honey is rich in aspartic acid, one of the amino acids. A New Jersey doctor has used very similar ingredients in a prescription drug to treat hundreds of women with what he calls “the housewife syndrome,” or chronic fatigue, insomnia and lethargy in lovemaking. 87 percent of his patients responded with a startling change in their condition: their fatigue and lethargy disappeared and they became cheerful and energetic.

Sesame seeds are one of the real wonder foods of nature. They are extremely rich in calcium; in fact they are richer in calcium than milk, cheese or nuts. Their protein content is high, too—19 to 28 percent—higher than meats; and sesame protein is of a very high quality. Sesame seeds are also very rich in unsaturated fatty acids and lecithin, in B-vitamins, especially inositol and choline, and they also are a good source of vitamin E—all substances vital for the health of the reproductive system.

Sesame is one of the earliest grains cultivated by man. Even now in many countries of the East, Middle East and East Europe, sesame seeds are a staple food. In the United States, you can buy plain sesame seeds or many various products made from sesame in health food stores. There is halvah, sesame seed oil, and many kinds of peanut-butter-like spreads.

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It has been long recognized that hair is a living part of your body, just as your skin, teeth or nails, and that it must be fed by your blood stream. Your blood can not deliver to your hair all the required nutrients unless it is supplied with all these nutrients from your food. But if your diet is deficient in some of the required vitamins, minerals, trace elements and proteins, then your blood will be deficient in these elements, too, and will not be able to supply them to your hair.

This is self evident—but this is only half of the truth!

It is often said that “you are what you eat,” which is also only half of the truth. The fact is that you are not what you eat, but what you assimilate. You may eat the most nutritious and best-balanced diet in the world, but if your digestive and assimilative system is out of order and can not assimilate the required nutrients and send them to the blood, then you still can be suffering from malnutrition and nutritional deficiencies.

The same is true in regard to hair growth. Books have been written on the relationship between nutrition and hair growth. You need such and such food factors in order to supply your hair with all the nutritive elements it needs for healthy growth. But if your blood vessels and the small blood capillaries in your scalp are so constricted that they are unable to supply blood to the hair follicles, then even if you eat the best food in the world and take all the extra nutrients required for hair growth in the form of vitamin and mineral supplements, it won’t do your hair a bit of good! Unless you improve the blood circulation in the scalp so that the required nutrients will be able to get to the hair roots, all your attempts to “feed your hair from within” will be futile.

That’s why the Swedish H-Pantoten tablets have been so successful. Not only do they contain the vital nutritive elements, known to science today to be essential for healthy hair growth, but they also contain certain B-complex vitamins known to be able to dilate the blood vessels so that these nutrients can travel through the blood stream to the hair roots.

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