Español, English below:
Antes de comenzar nuestro tiempo con pacientes, tenemos una semana de clases de competencia cultural. Hoy, aprendimos de la cosmovision latina–que hay comidas que son calientes, neutrales, o frias. Los estudiantes y yo no estuvamos seguros de esos, pero estuvamos acuerdos que es importante de comprender como nuestros pacientes compredren el mundo.

Nuestro maestro nos dijo que el puede probar una comida y dice si ella es caliente o fria. Una lista partial:

Frio:
Grasas
Leche/Queso/Yogurt
Huevos
Frijoles
Arroz
Platanos
Carnes
Pescado
Vegetales Verdes
Limon
Pan

Neutral:
Chocolate
Maiz
Sal

Caliente:
Chile
Cafe
Azucar
Te
Naranja
Condimento
Genigibe
Ajo
Menta
Alcohol

Es un poco extraño con algas comidas. Por ejemplo, el pan de horno (que esta caliente en temperatura) es una comida fria. Pero el pan mas viejo (que esta la temperatura de cuarto) es caliente.

Muchas personas creen que si se come demasiado de comidas de un typo (frio o caliente), va a hacerse enfermo. Tambien, las medicinas de medicos son calientes, entonces un paciente que toma una medicina va querer una comida fria.

Ingles:
Before we start seeing patients, we have a week of cultural competency here. Today we learned about ‘heaty’ and ‘cooling’ foods, the belief among many Latinos (and other cultures) that some foods are innately heating, while others are cooling. If a person eats too much of one category, he or she will fall ill. While all of us were a wee bit skeptical (placebo effect, anyone?), we all agreed it’s certainly important to understand our patients’ worldviews.

Our teacher said that he can taste foods and instantly tell if they’re heaty or cooling, even if they’re not necessarily hot or cold temperature-wise.

Here’s a very partial list.

Cooling:
Fatty foods
Dairy: milk, cheese, yogurt
Eggs
Beans
Rice
Bananas
Meats
Fish
Green Vegetables
Lemon, Lime
Bread

Neutral:
Chocolate
Corn
Salt

Hot:
Chiles
Coffee
Sugar
Tea
Oranges
Condiments
Ginger
Garlic
Mint
Alcohol

It doesn’t always make sense. For example, bread straight from the oven (hot, temperature-wise) is cooling. Bread that has been sitting out at room temperature is cooling.

Interestingly, all drugs we give patients are inherently heaty, so patients may often want to take the medicines with a cooling food to balance things out.

Ack, back to class. More mas tarde.

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