Safe food options during immune thrombocytopenia

Immune thrombocytopenia (ITP) is a condition in which patients can bleed or bruise easily and excessively. Seeking proper professional guidance and therapy is crucial in such situations, but that alone cannot help improve the quality of life. Healthy lifestyles and food choices can also play a pivotal role in helping these patients combat the disease. Therapy and healthy food choices go hand in hand to provide better patient care and ensure minimum health risks.

Fats
Avoiding fats from one’s meals is not a recommended approach to healthy meals. Foods rich in healthy unsaturated fats also bring numerous nutrients to the table. This includes options like nuts and seeds, avocados, nut butter, and high-quality cooking oils or ghee. Including healthy fats in meals can also help immune thrombocytopenia patients cope better with their stress. The higher number of calories in these food products proves beneficial to the body. Avoiding unhealthy or saturated fats in meals is one of the most common pieces of advice people with any health condition get. This is especially important for people who stand a risk of cardiac diseases. Since ITP patients are prescribed prolonged corticosteroid usage, food that can negatively impact the heart should be avoided as much as possible. Therefore, eliminating or avoiding foods containing saturated or trans fats is sound advice.

Meat
Having healthy portions of protein in each meal helps the body recover and maintain steady energy and sugar levels. It is, therefore, essential to include good quality lean protein sourced from foods like eggs, beans and lentils, poultry, nuts and seeds, and fish. Meat is also a reliable source of iron, a mineral that could be found lacking in people with ITP. On the other hand, processed meat sources are a definite no on the list of foods ITP patients can enjoy. Along with red meat, these are all protein food sources that carry high levels of saturated fats than preferred for a healthy meal. Besides, processed meat is also rich in sodium, which threatens the patient’s blood pressure levels.

Grains
Complex carbohydrates are necessary to complete a healthy and balanced meal. Some common recommendations include whole grains and whole grain products like oat, whole wheat bread, pasta, and quinoa. While increasing the intake of whole grains, it is essential to avoid refined carbohydrates. Foods with added sugars or sugar syrups are high on the list of foods and drinks to be avoided to fight immune thrombocytopenia.