Latest Dietitian's Blog Posts
Planning for a Happy and Healthy Holiday Season!
The holidays are right around the corner and whether you've already started planning, shopping and wrapping or you leave it all to the end, we wanted to give you some strategies to manage your kidney diet over the holidays. Somehow holidays and celebrations always seem to centre around food and holiday meals are an important time of sharing with family and friends. So when it comes to getting through the holidays without any medical problems, the key is …
Kidney Friendly Cooking for people with chronic kidney disease: a NEW COOKBOOK!
This is a guest blog by Leah Butcher, dietetic summer student at Kidney Foundation of Canada At the Kidney Foundation, we get numerous calls about which renal friendly cookbooks we would recommend. If you only need to reduce sodium there are MANY cookbooks out there. But if you need to limit sodium, potassium, AND phosphorus, the number of cookbooks on Amazon is limited and many are at least a decade old. There’s a lot of work that …
Modifying Chinese Food to Fit a Renal Diet
This is a guest blog by Leah Butcher, dietetic summer student at Kidney Foundation of Canada We know that there are benefits to following a renal diet if you have kidney disease. For instance, reducing sodium (salt) intake can help lower blood pressure, decrease the sense of thirst and reduce the risk of edema (swelling) in the arms, legs and face. However not everyone who has kidney disease finds it easy to stick to their diet restrictions. …
Spotlight on phosphorus: the nutrition facts table’s missing mineral
This is a guest blog by Emily Robins, Dietetic Intern, Grand River Hospital – Kitchener, ON Over the past four weeks I have had the opportunity to intern under the supervision of June Martin, Registered Dietitian for the Grand River Regional Renal Program. I have spent most of my time here working with patients in the hemodialysis unit, assessing their nutritional status and providing nutrition intervention and counselling as needed. As a student I learned that one …
A happy and healthy holiday season!
As the holidays draw ever nearer (and my list of things to do seems to get longer) food is constantly on my mind! What to cook, when to cook, how much to cook and of course trying to make everyone happy. And I don't even have to worry about a renal diet! So to make life seem more manageable I try to make lists and do some of the food prep in advance. While it's …
Is there a banana hiding in your sandwich?
There aren’t too many “nutrition emergencies” in the hospital setting. But when a patient has a critically high potassium level they shoot to the top of our must-see list. Potassium, which is an important nutrient for most people, can become dangerously high in kidney patients and can lead to serious and immediate complications, including a heart attack if high enough. Last week, one of my patients developed a high potassium level which was pretty unusual for …
Respect the renal diet!
Every once in a while I hear something that really sticks with me. Today I met with a lovely patient who has been following some sort of renal diet for the last seven years. She expressed to me how frustrating it is when people give her “healthy” diet advice while critiquing her food choices. Limiting dairy and choosing white bread might seem strange to others but for this patient, they were an important strategy for …
Savour Summer with New Recipes!
After a long, cold winter it is time to enjoy the warm weather and the wonderful, fresh foods that come along with that. Whether it’s blueberries, raspberries or fresh lettuce right out of your garden, the summer seems to make everything taste better! I’m excited to announce that there are ten beautiful and delicious new recipes available at www.myspiceitup.ca to celebrate the 10th issue of the Spice It Up! series of cookbooks. Next time you’re having a barbeque …
Have your say!
As if the kidney diet isn’t already complicated enough, there is a new food additive to watch for and avoid (for those on a restricted potassium diet). I’ve written a fair amount about phosphate food additives which should be avoided by everyone who has or is at risk for chronic kidney disease. But there’s a new additive that has been approved by Health Canada for use in meat and meat products. It’s called potassium lactate …
What you see may not be what you get!
Vitamins, minerals and herbal supplements are a big business in Canada. Many people take vitamin supplements as a bit of an “insurance policy” just in case their diet isn’t quite as good as it should be. Or sometimes just because they think it might do some good and probably won’t do any harm. Others use herbals and supplements to cure or prevent disease. But there is little science to support the routine use of supplements …