Who Can Get Benefitted From Carbs?

Carbs is a commonly used short form of carbohydrate. Carbohydrate molecules are the major source of energy that keeps our bodies movable. Carbs are important for muscle build-up and cell regeneration. Apart from that, carbohydrates also help in digestion, maintaining blood sugar levels. While there are a lot of times, where a person is asked to avoid intake of carbohydrates, yet carbs play an important role to maintain a healthy life.⁽¹⁾

Certain health conditions require a person to avoid carbs completely like a person suffering from diabetes or a person who is obese. Despite the fact that carbs can be considered as unimportant, there are certain groups of people who can be benefitted from Carbs. This discussion focuses on the uses of carbs for various groups of individuals and also their advantages.

Regular physical training is a must for every athlete. So, for training or practice, they need more energy or calorie and carbs can produce energy very fast. Therefore, athletes need more carbohydrates than normal humans to do their daily training or practice. After eating carbs, it gets broken down into simple carbohydrate molecules (glucose) and the body uses glucose to produce energy quickly.^{(1, 2)} Apart from that, the digestion time of carbohydrates is very fast in comparison with other macronutrients like fats and proteins. Therefore, athletes prefer to consume more carbohydrates than other people to get the instant energy required for their training.⁽³⁾

Athletes consume carbohydrates in the form of fluid and other sources of foods (such as gels, and bars). In addition to that, athletes also use carbs as a performance booster. With the availability of carbohydrates in the body, athletes can be involved in prolonged performance and high-intensity exercise.

During pregnancy, the calorie demand in the woman’s body increases. Therefore, pregnant women and women who are breastfeeding need to fulfil the requirement for extra energy in their bodies, otherwise, the health of the woman and child will get affected by that. As already stated, carbs are the primary source of energy. Hence, pregnant and women who are breastfeeding should add carbohydrates-enriched food like rice, fresh vegetables, all kinds of fruits and grains, etc. to their daily diet in order to bridge the energy gap. Even, World Health Organization (WHO) suggested that to recover from the morning sickness, every pregnant woman should consume more nutritious carbohydrate foods and avoid fatty and sugary foods.⁽⁴⁾

After surgery, our body needs time for recovery. Hence, nutritious food enriched with macronutrients such as carbohydrates helps our body to recover very quickly after surgery. Fatigue is one of the common problems after surgery. Therefore, intake of carbs as per the guidance of the healthcare professional helps to get sufficient energy and prevent fatigue. Apart from that, carbohydrate also helps in preventing protein and muscle breakdown and reduce the recovery period.  It is not that only carbohydrate is required for a speedy recovery;⁽⁵⁾ along with carbohydrates, eating proteins, fat, vitamins, and other micronutrients are equally important.

Being underweight is a serious problem. There are multiple reasons behind being underweight such as family history, malnutrition, mental illness, high metabolism rate, doing extra exercise, loss of appetite, etc. One of the healthful approaches to gaining weight is consuming carbohydrates in a prescribed quantity.^{(1, 6)} Therefore, if you are suffering from being underweight, then you should add carbohydrates and protein-rich food to your diet plan, for example, fresh vegetables, almonds, peanuts, grain, fruits, mashed potatoes, etc.

The modern generation is more inclined to low-carb diets (diets without or little amount of carbohydrate). However, low-carb diets are not suitable for children.

Carbohydrates provide fuel for the active brain and growing muscle of children. In addition to that, carbohydrates are essential macronutrients for promoting good health for children and providing them energy for daily activities. Good sources of carbohydrates that can be used as nutritious food for children are milk, yogurt, potato, beans, rice, white bread, brown rice, cereals, and crackers. As per the study, Children (age 1- 10 years) have to consume 130 gm of carbs daily. However, the daily requirement of the carbohydrate can be varied as per the activities of children.⁽⁷⁾

Bodybuilders require something that will provide the energy that helps them to carry on their workout. The body instantly consumes carbohydrate and produce energy from that. Therefore, consuming carbohydrates during workouts supplies energy to the muscle of the bodybuilders. In addition to that, intake of moderate to high levels of carbohydrate diet helps in muscle growth, preventing break down of muscle, speedy recovery from training, etc. The daily requirement of carbohydrates depends on the body weight. For example, research stated that bodybuilders need to consume about 4-7 grams of carbohydrates per kilogram of their weight daily.⁽⁸⁾

In a nutshell, for maintaining healthy life, carbohydrates are indispensable. Along with carbohydrates taking other macronutrients (protein, fat) and micronutrients (iron, zinc, calcium etc.) is equally important.  However, consuming carbohydrates or other nutrients excessively may affect the body negatively. Therefore, every person should take macro and micronutrients after consultation with the general physician.

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Also Read:

• What Causes Carbohydrates to Increase Your Weight & How to Prevent it?
• Ketogenic Diet & Sleep Problems: How are Carbohydrates and Ketosis Associated with Disturbed Sleep?
• What Happens With Carbohydrate Deficiency & Which are the Disease Linked to it?
• Complex or Simple Carbohydrates – Which One Should You Eat?