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We created this Carb Counting Quick Reference sheet based on the ADA handbook. With the holidays and New Year around the corner, this cheat sheet of the most common carbs with serving size is a perfect reference for people counting carbs. Plus, it is perfect for exam prep for the health care professionals.
If you are studying for the diabetes certification exam, this reference provides the most common 15gm carb sources and their serving size. One exception is the milk serving – this list was created for people with diabetes and was simplified – we have modified it to reflect the actual carb count of a serving of milk (12 grams, not 15 grams of carbohydrates).
Learn more carb counting tips and tricks, and nutrition information in our Level 1 and 3 courses!
Start 2020 off right with Level 1 updates in January, Boot Camp (Level 3) updates in February and March, and a bundle to save on all the courses! We’re here to help make your New Year’s resolution a reality with great, on-demand videos, podcasts, handouts, extra resources, and practice tests to help you succeed at any diabetes certification exam.
Sign up for Diabetes Blog Bytes – we post one daily Blog Byte from Monday to Friday. And of course, Tuesday is our Question of the Week. It’s Informative and FREE! Sign up below!
[yikes-mailchimp form=”1″]Many may find they don’t want to exercise because they want to avoid sweating or what sweating may cause. For women it can be a hassle to have to shower off after a workout, but for many African American women it can be a larger hurdle. Health Day News reports on this difficulty and the fact that many providers are unaware of this particular issue as a barrier to exercise.
Researchers at Ohio State University found that 95% of doctors speak with African American, females about exercise, but 76% of them do not include hair in the discussion and only 34% were comfortable with the idea of discussing hair along with exercise.
Dr. Tolliver is a family medicine physician at Ohio State and was the lead researcher in this study. She explained:
It’s going to come down to increasing education about African-American hair, African-American females’ cultural practices when it comes to hair, and how you can counsel a patient in an office visit about decreasing that barrier.
Dr. Tolliver advised that for African American women wanting to become more physically active, but who consider hair a barrier:
Read more at Health Day News.
Sign up for Diabetes Blog Bytes – we post one daily Blog Byte from Monday to Friday. And of course, Tuesday is our Question of the Week. It’s Informative and FREE! Sign up below!
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Our Diabetes Detective Team scans the diabetes news to discover the most relevant info that Diabetes Educators need in their daily practice. We post one daily Blog Byte from Monday to Friday. And of course, Tuesday is our Question of the Week. It’s Informative and FREE! Sign up below!
Earn 9 CEs online at your own pace, or join us as we go through all of Level 1 in January. See the full schedule here. Level 1 provides the critical information every Diabetes Care and Education Specialist should know. It’s the perfect refresher series and starting point when studying for the CDCES exam.
Sign up for Diabetes Blog Bytes – we post one daily Blog Byte from Monday to Friday. And of course, Tuesday is our Question of the Week. It’s Informative and FREE! Sign up below!
[yikes-mailchimp form=”1″]Experts are meeting with congress to encourage investigation of the relationship of human exposure to perfluoroakyl and polyperfluoroakyl (PFAS) on weight and osteoporosis.
Early studies have shown a link between greater PFAS exposure and increased risk for endocrine outcomes like BMI >30, but more research is needed specifically to examine factors like exposure timing,” Abby Fleisch, MD, MPH
Read More here – Endocrine Today Article
These commonly found chemical PFA substances are endocrine disrupting chemicals and may be the driving factor responsible for a variety of adverse health outcomes.
PFAS are a large and expanding group of man-made compounds that are widely used to make everyday products more resistant to stains, grease and water, according to the NIH.
PFAS can be found in nonstick cookware, stain-resistant carpeting, to-go containers, cleaning products, drinking water, microwave popcorn, and even fire extinguisher foam. Toxic Free Future advises avoiding common packaged foods with grease repellent coatings (such as pizza and french fry boxes), avoid stain resistance treatments on furniture, and check personal care products for teflon, “fluoro” or “perfluoro.”
Toxic Free Future has created a fantastic educational flyer on PFAS, it’s sources, and easy alternatives:
For more tips on minimizing exposure to PFAS and what can be done about PFAS, you can visit Toxic Free Future’s website here. We also discuss PFAs in our recent FREE Webinar, Getting to the Gut. Click below to get started.
Sign up for Diabetes Blog Bytes – we post one daily Blog Byte from Monday to Friday. And of course, Tuesday is our Question of the Week. It’s Informative and FREE! Sign up below!
[yikes-mailchimp form=”1″]For Question of the week, test takers usually choose the correct answer 70-80% of the time. However, for the question of the week on November 19, about 37% of respondents chose the correct answer.
So, we thought this would be a perfect opportunity for another answer rationale. We’ll explore this question and the best answer in more detail and throw in some test-taking tips along the way. Before we start though, if you don’t want any spoilers and haven’t tried the question yet, you can answer below:
Question of the week on November 19:
LS is a 21-year-old college student with new diabetes. LS arrives for an office visit and is very agitated explaining that they are checking their blood glucose at the same time on two different meters, but the results are always different. LS states, “How can I trust these readings?”. What is the educator’s best response?
Answer Choices:
As shown above, the most common choice was option 1, the second most common answer was option 4, then option 2, and finally option 3.
Option 1 was the juicy answer: “I can totally understand your frustration” is a valid empathetic response, but not the best response in the scenario. If you follow our questions of the week closely, you’ll see a pattern of an empathetic response being the correct one, and if the scenario above ended with “LS arrives for an office visit and is very agitated” it may have been the right answer. However, LS goes on to ask how they can trust the readings. This question is calling for a practical response, which eliminates Option 1, since it acknowledges feelings but does not make steps forward beyond that to fix the situation.
Option 2 and Option 3 are both good answers, because they are steps someone could take to see if their glucose meter is giving accurate readings.
Option 4 is the best answer. This is because to perform quality control on each meter you would likely go through the steps mentioned in Option 2 and Option 3 as well as other assessments of the device (such as using control solution and comparing the meter result to the lab results).
Also, we discourage people from comparing meters, since one might read on the low end (while still being within the required accuracy range) and the other meter might read on the high end. Plus, it usually requires 2 different blood samples, which due to timing, can lead to different results.
The best way to evaluate meter accuracy is to compare the device to a lab draw and also review the MARD report. (See our blog on meter accuracy).
November 19’s question of the week was meant to test on best rather than correct answers.
We hope you appreciate this week’s rationale and keep studying hard! Thank you so much for taking the time to answer our Question of the Week and participate in this fun learning activity!
Sign up for Diabetes Blog Bytes – we post one daily Blog Byte from Monday to Friday. And of course, Tuesday is our Question of the Week. It’s Informative and FREE! Sign up below!
[yikes-mailchimp form=”1″]Our Diabetes Detective Team scans the diabetes news to discover the most relevant info that Diabetes Educators need in their daily practice. We post one daily Blog Byte from Monday to Friday. And of course, Tuesday is our Question of the Week. It’s Informative and FREE! Sign up below!
Earn 7.5 CEs at Diabetes 2020: Getting to the Heart of Diabetes Care while getting critical clinical updates from Coach Beverly. Learn more below:
Sign up for Diabetes Blog Bytes – we post one daily Blog Byte from Monday to Friday. And of course, Tuesday is our Question of the Week. It’s Informative and FREE! Sign up below!
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In a study conducted by University of California San Francisco’s (UCSF) Elissa Epel and colleagues, Epel wanted to evaluate the relationship between access to sugar-sweetened beverages (SSB) in the workplace and total daily consumption.
Epel and team banned the sale of all SSBs at UCSF for 10 months. Her team found that in employees deemed “frequent” SSB drinkers, consumption went down from 35 fluid ounces to a startling 17 oz.
Even though the employees still had access to SSBs outside of the campus, their consumption decreased significantly, highlighting the impact of eliminating access to SSBs in the work environment.
“This shows us that simply ending sales of sugary drinks in the workplace can have a meaningful effect on improving health in less than one year,” Epel said in a statement. “There is a well-known pathway from soda to disease. High sugar intake leads to abdominal fat and insulin resistance, which are known risk factors for diabetes, heart disease, cancer and even dementia. Recent studies have also linked sugar intake to early mortality.”
But this correlation was not enough for Epel. Before the ban went into effect, her team recruited 214 full-time employees who were self-reported “frequent” SSB drinkers. Epel and her team then randomly separated the employees into two groups: one group would receive a motivational intervention along with the SSB ban, while the other group wouldn’t receive any intervention. The motivational intervention included a 15-minute motivational session to begin and 5-minute calls one week, one month, and sixth months after the ban was put into effect.
The results were astounding; the participants in the intervention group consumed 25.4 oz less compared to the control group who only consumed 8.2 oz less.
Epel and her team had successfully proven a correlation between banning SSBs and consumption as well as a correlation between intervention and consumption. To read more about Epel’s study click here.
Sign up for Diabetes Blog Bytes – we post one daily Blog Byte from Monday to Friday. And of course, Tuesday is our Question of the Week. It’s Informative and FREE! Sign up below!
[yikes-mailchimp form=”1″]Flu season is upon us! People with diabetes (type 1, type 2, or gestational), even when well-managed, are at high risk of serious flu complications, which can result in hospitalization and sometimes even death.
Many people are reluctant to get the flu shot. Help move them out of pre-contemplation to action with this informative and upbeat instructional video and song!
Is an educational and entertaining method to bring to light information about the Flu and the Flu Shot…through music!
“The Flu Shot Song” by Nurse Master Charlie, provides a general overview and the science behind why the flu vaccine works to prevent the flu; All while using the universal language of music!!!
This upbeat and informational video describes a quick history, along with transmission methods, differentiation, symptoms, prevention, diagnosis and treatment of the flu.
Nurse Master Charlie pictured at the CA AADE Meeting
Contact or follow Nurse Master Charlie
Instagram: Nurse Master Charlie
Facebook: Nurse Master Charlie
YouTube: Nurse Master Charlie
Twitter: Nurse Master Charlie
Email: [email protected]
Sign up for Diabetes Blog Bytes – we post one daily Blog Byte from Monday to Friday. And of course, Tuesday is our Question of the Week. It’s Informative and FREE! Sign up below!
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