White rice has always been a home remedy that our mothers and grandmothers used when ‘prescribing’ recovery after gastroenteritis. For some reason, it was considered to be a healthy soft diet food that helped the stomach settle. However, we have consulted a nutritionist who, like most, defends the idea that The best thing in these cases is not to ingest anything..
The Dr. María José Crispínfrom Clínica Menorca, summarizes the experts’ general advice in one sentence: “If a person has a lot of diarrhea, what they have to do at least during the first day is give them a rest to the intestinethat is, not eating. And you have to replace the fluids you lose due to diarrhea, fluids and electrolytes.”
When faced with gastroenteritis, it is best not to ingest anything other than liquids
At first, for severe diarrhea, “the best healing aspect is not white rice, it is best not to eat any food and replenish fluids. We can do it using oral serum from the pharmacy or, if we don’t like it, with water with lemon and salt, baking soda and a little sugar. This solution is better than the Aquarius, because it has more sugar, and what we need is more potassium,” explains the doctor.
The next day, if we are better and we don’t have so many bowel movements, what we should do is go little by little replenishing the food. Does it have to be white rice? No.
“White rice is not bad, what I believe is that the day we start to replace food we should go slowly and our food has to be astringent foods, That is, with little fiber, foods that help us so that the intestine does not have anything that causes more diarrhea, quite the opposite. In this sense, white rice works well, and rice water, obviously not brown rice.”
Recommended foods to recover from gastroenteritis
White rice can be a food that helps us recover, but not on the first or second day, and in no case in its versions with greater amount of fiber. From there, it is not the only food recommended by the nutritionist.
“It could also be a bit of white pastea little cooked potato, a carrot puree… That is, what it has to be is something that does not contain a lot of fiber and that we feel like. If we like light white rice we can eat white rice, but if we prefer a little non-whole white pasta or a boiled potato it’s fine.”
What we should not eat with gastroenteritis
What is not recommended in any case by the expert is “eating broccoli, spinach, or chard. However, I tell you yes to refined carbohydratessomething I never advise except for diarrhea. It always has to be in small quantities and must be accompanied by easily digestible protein.”
What does the doctor mean by easily digestible proteins?“For a lean protein, which can be boiled fish, or chicken, better than meat, a protein that does not have a lot of fat. As for the preparation, it is preferable for it to be boiled or cooked, or grilled, better than battered, because it provides extra fat”.
White rice is not the panacea after diarrhea
Dr. Crispín does not think that the consumption of rice after gastroenteritis is neither good nor badwhat it does not claim is that it is the panacea in any case, nor the only recommended food.
The key is to follow some basic guidelines, and to listen to your body, to see ‘what I feel like’. “I don’t think white rice is good or bad, what is needed is for the food to be incorporated little by little and whatever I feel like. If I feel like a little bit of white rice with a boiled small whitingor a boiled potato with a chicken breast, then great.”
In summary, “no, white rice is not ‘mandatory’ as a soft diet after suffering from diarrhea. It is not a panacea, nor is it the opposite to restore the normal function of the intestine damaged by gastroenteritis. Let’s not forget that a soft diet is not means soft foods, but easily digestible by the body“.
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