A neutropenic diet is a diet with a low level of white blood cells in the blood.

Leukocytes in our blood are mainly neutrophils, therefore a low level of leukocytes is called neutropenia.

This usually happens to people on chemotherapy. And there really is a diet used, but it does not raise white blood cells. It reduces the risk of contracting an infection.

When we eat a variety of foods and eat what we want, we constantly risk getting food poisoning. For a healthy person, this is not too scary, but for a patient with a low level of white blood cells it can be dangerous.

There is a set of rules that allows you to minimize the possibility of picking up an infection.

Some experts believe that the effectiveness of the neutropenic diet has not been proven, but a lot specialized oncological institutions still use these rules, because harm from them definitely not.

Neutropenic diet

• wash your hands before preparing food;
• wash kitchen utensils well with hot water and detergent;
• it is better to wipe surfaces in the kitchen with disposable paper towels;
• wash vegetables and fruits under running water and, if possible, with a brush;
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• wash the can before opening;
• separate meat, seafood, and eggs from all other foods in your bags and refrigerator;
• use a separate cutting board for such products;
• never put prepared food on an unwashed cutting board;
• if you marinated something, then boil this marinade before reuse;
• marinate food only in the refrigerator;
• Get yourself a kitchen thermometer to measure the internal temperature of hot foods;
• forget about soft-boiled eggs;
• Forget cold meats like ham or sausage
• the same with smoked or salted fish;
• Avoid salads and other cold crushed snacks if possible.
• do not eat unpasteurized dairy products, freshly squeezed juice and non-thermally processed honey;
• do not eat foods that have expired;
• do not eat any sprouts or sprouted grains;
• Turn the food over several times during cooking so that it warms up evenly;
• in most cases, yesterday's leftovers must be heated to 70 degrees before eating;
• leftovers can be stored in the refrigerator at a temperature not exceeding 4 degrees for no longer than two days;
• if yesterday's sauce remains, then it must be boiled before eating;
• in the refrigerator, the temperature should be no higher than 4 degrees, and in the freezer - minus 18 or lower.