xylitol

Be careful, I use xylitol regularly for the same reasons but I find that it makes me tired and fuzzy if I take the same amount as sugar. \nI have suffered a lot with teeth problems since a child, but now at close to 40 I have managed to stabilize oral health and haven't had a cavity in more than 10 years.

Also glaringly absent is any mention of the sugar alcohols: sorbitol, xylitol, maltitol. Who cares about saccharin.

When you search on xylitol, use "futile cycle" in the query --essentially, bacteria take xylitol up because it looks enough like a genuine, useful sugar, but can't do anything metabolically useful with it. It would be like humans spending all our energy chewing wood.

Even if it is all in her head, you can make her at least happier, if not healthier by suggesting that she also avoid foods with sucrose or monomeric fructose, and substitute them with alternatives such as xylitol, glycerol, maltose, or ordinary glucose corn syrup. If the patient is ignorant, that is a condition the doctor should be expected to cure.

Erythritol exhibits some, but not all, of xylitol's tendency to "starve" harmful bacteria. Unlike xylitol, erythritol is actually absorbed into the bloodstream after consumption but before excretion.

Possessing approximately 40% less food energy, xylitol is a low-calorie alternative to table sugar. Absorbed more slowly than sugar, it does not contribute to high blood sugar levels or the resulting hyperglycemia caused by insufficient insulin response.

To a certain extent, xylitol and glycerol will also have a laxative effect, but as erythritol is absorbed by the gut, it is the only sugar alcohol that can be consumed in excess without dire colonic consequences.

Because xylitol is absorbed more slowly from the gut and gut microflora appear to be the mechanism of action found in this study, I'd personally be at least a little concerned. Mice in this study were given sweeteners for 11 weeks, long enough that their use apparently led to changes in microflora which were associated with glucose intolerance. Existing studies of xylitol could well be for much shorter lengths of time and might not have been able to detect these kinds of changes.

The reason I mention xylitol is because it's naturally ocurring in plants and our own body - unlike most sweeteners; has proven positive effects for oral health; and hasn't been linked to any ill effects so far, so it's high on the list of possible 100% safe sugar substitutes.

Other sweeteners like xylitol, stevia extract, and erythritol are easier to find. Xylitol and erythritol are not sweeter than sugar, and I find stevia unpleasant.