In reply to the coment posted above: Our alerts are not intended to be the final word on any topic. In our 2007 Diabetes White Paper we talk briefly about the glycemic index. Here is an excerpt:
Q. Some say that the glycemic index can be useful in meal planning. I have read that the “glycemic load” is more accurate. What is the glycemic load and should I use it?
A. The glycemic index (GI) is a system for ranking how fast and how much blood glucose rises when you eat a food that contains carbohydrates, compared with eating the same amount of carbohydrates in the form of white bread. It’s true that eating a diet that contains mostly low-GI foods makes it easier to maintain steady blood glucose levels. Unfortunately, this method unfairly demonizes certain foods. For instance, carrots have a high GI, suggesting that you should avoid them. But you would need to gnaw through seven raw carrots to get the same amount of carbohydrates in white bread.
A concept called the glycemic load (GL) treats the carrot a little more fairly. It’s determined by multiplying a food’s GI by the number of carbohydrate grams in a serving. So that carrot with a high GI now has a low GL, if you eat one or two instead of seven. But there’s still a problem. Both GI and GL look at foods in isolation. The numbers do not reflect other foods that you might eat at the same time. For example, eating carrots with a butter sauce will lower the GI and GL of the carrots, because fat slows the absorption of food in your digestive tract. Confused? So are a lot of people, and rightly so. We recommend that rather than fussing over numbers, become familiar with the broad categories of foods that tend to have the biggest impact on your blood glucose (for example, certain Chinese foods, pizza, and nondiet beverages), and replace these foods with healthier choices.
Editor, Johns Hopkins Health Alerts
