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The next time you’re thirsty, it could be smart to think before you drink. While people say “you are what you eat,” the phrase is more accurately “you are what you drink.” Human bodies are about 60 percent water, and while watery foods can help meet your needs, most of your daily water needs are met from the fluids you drink.

Aside from plain water, consumers are faced with a dizzying array of juices, juice drinks, vitamin-fortified waters, sports drinks, energy drinks and teas-making it difficult to choose the best beverage to help meet fluid needs.

Even though plain water might suffice for the average exerciser, many people prefer drinks with a little flavor, and tastier fluids may encourage consumption. As exercise duration and intensity increase, it’s important to not only replace fluid losses, but to replace body salts, such as sodium and potassium, that are lost with sweating.

Look Before You Drink

When evaluating beverages, a good place to start is by reading the nutrition facts label. For instance, sodas or fruit drinks are often high in calories and sugar and low on nutrients. Not only can these empty calories pile on the pounds, the high sugar concentration in sodas and fruit drinks can actually slow down the rate at which the body absorbs fluid. If you see high-fructose corn syrup at the top of the ingredient list, you may want to pass. Sugars other than fructose, in lower concentrations, are much better absorbed.

Some energy drinks have a combination of caffeine and sugar, designed to give you a quick spike in energy. But if you aren’t used to consuming caffeinated drinks, these could make you jittery or upset your stomach.

So what should you look for? It’s a good idea to check labels for electrolytes, such as sodium and potassium, which are salts that your body loses when you perspire. In addition to replacing what’s lost, electrolytes can add some flavor, which will encourage you to drink more. Also, look for drinks with less than 100 calories per 8-ounce serving. Higher calories means a higher sugar concentration; you don’t want to drink back the calories you just burned on the treadmill.

While too much sugar can be a problem, a little bit of carbohydrate in beverages can help to maintain blood sugar while you’re exercising. A mixture of several forms of carbohydrate in the drink helps get carbohydrates into working muscle better than just one carbohydrate source.

A drink such as Herbalife’s new H3O™ could be a good choice because it contains the right amount of readily absorbed carbohydrates, no caffeine and the essential electrolytes people lose when they perspire. It comes in a powder that mixes easily with water and is available either in a canister or in convenient single-serving “stick packs” that can be thrown in a bag or pocket and mixed into any water bottle.

Staying Hydrated

You may become dehydrated before you are actually thirsty. This is one reason athletes learn to drink on a schedule. Two cups of fluid a couple of hours before you start exercising should be followed with another cup or so 10 to 20 minutes before you start. A few ounces every 15 minutes or so when you are working out can help prevent excessive fluid losses. Watch for other signs and symptoms of dehydration during exercise, such as muscle cramping or feeling light-headed or faint.

Even if you’re only a weekend warrior, adequate fluids are important for a healthy, well-functioning body. If you think you drink less than you should, a flavorful beverage, designed to help you hydrate, might be just the thing to help meet your fluid needs.

It’s a good idea to hydrate with a low-calorie beverage that’s high in electrolytes.

What’s the secret to enjoying dessert without the weight gain? Keep the portion sizes small and get at least 30 minutes of physical activity daily.

Health experts such as Dr. Barbara Rolls, author of “The Volumetrics Eating Plan,” and the scientists behind the Weight Watchers program say that including favorite foods is important, if not essential, for managing your weight. Dr. Rolls suggests choosing between a small portion of a dense dessert-say, a brownie-or a larger portion of a dessert that is less dense, like strawberries. Weight Watchers provides a weekly “allowance” for extras like desserts.

I asked Evelyn Tribole, R.D., author of “Healthy Homestyle Cooking” and “More Healthy Homestyle Cooking,” to share a few of her ideas for reducing the calories in desserts. She recommends substituting applesauce for up to half the oil in a cake, using ricotta cheese or light cream cheese instead of regular and switching to reduced-fat ice cream or frozen yogurt. That said, Evelyn’s favorite lower-calorie desserts require no recipe modification. “I dip strawberries in melted chocolate, enjoy a bowl of mango sorbet topped with fresh raspberries or savor a small, high-quality chocolate bar,” says Tribole. “A 220-calorie bar has fewer calories than most traditional desserts.”

Give this scrumptious lower-calorie dessert a try.

Pecan-Blueberry Crisp

1 can (21 oz) blueberry pie filling with more fruit

1 bag (10 to 12 oz) frozen blueberries (do not thaw)

11/2 cups Total® cereal

1/4 cup chopped pecans

2 tablespoons packed brown sugar

1 tablespoon butter or margarine, melted

1. Heat oven to 375° F. Spray bottom and sides of 8-inch square baking dish with cooking spray. In baking dish, mix pie filling and frozen blueberries until well blended.

2. Place cereal in plastic bag and crush with rolling pin. In small bowl, mix cereal, pecans and brown sugar. Drizzle with butter; toss with fork until mixture is coated. Sprinkle cereal mixture over fruit in baking dish.

3. Bake 20 to 25 minutes or until bubbly around edges and golden brown on top. Let stand 10 to 15 minutes before serving. 12 servings (1/3 cup each)

Even with all the new diet plans on the market today, one of the healthiest may be a regimen that’s centuries old-the Mediterranean diet, which consists of large amounts of fresh fruit and vegetables, salads, nuts, seeds, beans (including chickpeas), omega-3-rich oily fish, olives and olive oil.

According to scientists, these foods provide health benefits due to their antioxidant properties. For example, children who eat a normal Mediterranean diet are 30 percent less likely to develop hay fever. The diet has also been shown to reduce the risk of type 2 diabetes, hypertension, heart disease and several cancers.

Eat, drink and be healthy

Made from authentic Mediterranean recipes and containing fresh chickpeas, Sabra’s trans fat- and cholesterol-free dips and spreads can be a delicious staple of a healthy diet.

While you may know that it is important to stay hydrated, you may not realize caffeinated beverages, in addition to water, can help. A report from the Institute of Medicine (IOM) says drinks containing caffeine can count toward your daily water intake.

According to Dr. Lawrence Appel of Johns Hopkins University, “While drinking water is a frequent choice for hydration, people also get water from juice, milk, coffee, tea, soda, fruits, vegetables and other food and beverages as well.”

Caffeine and Athletes

A study by Lawrence Armstrong, Ph.D., published in the International Journal of Sport Nutrition and Exercise Metabolism, found athletes do not experience a fluid-electrolyte imbalance associated with negative health effects or decreased exercise performance if they consume caffeinated beverages in moderation and eat a typical American diet. In fact, some studies show caffeine can enhance athletic performance while contributing to hydration.

While the IOM recommends 91 ounces of fluid for healthy women and 125 ounces for healthy men per day, it also noted the need for water significantly increases with strenuous or prolonged physical activity and for those living in hot climates. Fortunately for many, a review of studies conducted on “Caffeine Ingestion and Fluid Balance” published in the Journal of Human Nutrition and Dietetics said, “…there would appear to be no clear basis for refraining from caffeine-containing drinks in situations where fluid balance might be compromised.”

Although caffeine is considered a mild diuretic, it does not generally contribute to dehydration because the liquid in the beverage itself cancels out any loss of fluid in the body. In fact, a study on “The Effect of Caffeinated, Non-Caffeinated, Caloric and Non-Caloric Beverages on Hydration” in the Journal of the American College of Nutrition concluded that there were “no significant differences in the effect of various combinations of beverages on hydration status of healthy adult males.” Therefore, according to this study, “advising people to disregard caffeinated beverages as part of the daily fluid intake is not substantiated.”

How to Tell if You’re Dehydrated

Clearly, if you are thirsty, you should have something to drink. Other signs of dehydration include: dry mouth, swollen tongue, weakness, dizziness, confusion, sluggishness or fainting.

Are you in a charge of running a healthcare center, like a hospital or a doctor’s office? If you are, you may be interested in having your physicians reviewed, at one point or another. A physician peer review is a great way to know whether the physicians working for you are working to the best of their ability. The only question is what do you do with bad physician peer review results?

When it comes to dealing with poor physician peer review results, you may never even have to deal with the problem. One of the reasons for that is because there are many physicians who work to the best of their ability and then some. There is a good chance that the physicians who work for you are the same way, but it is always nice to know what to do if one of your physicians isn’t meeting your expectations.

If the physician peer review results you received from an outside peer reviewing company where not what you had hoped for you, you have a number of different options. One of your first thoughts may be to get rid of the physician who is causing the problems. Of course, it is your decision to make, but you may want to use removal only as a last resort. There are actually a number of better alternatives that can be used. Plus, it is actually important to note that one bad review doesn’t make a physician a bad one.

Depending on the physician peer review company that you choose to do business with, you should be given detailed documents of all reviews. If you are given these extra documents, you will want to read through them all. This will help give you more insight into one of your physician’s peer reviews, instead of just a positive or a negative marking. Also, the notes written by the reviewer can actually be used for your own benefit. You may not necessarily think about it at the time, but a physician peer review can also be used as training for all healthcare workers, including physicians, as it can let you in on areas that need to be improved and by whom.

Should you get a physician in your establishment who ends up with a poor physician peer review rating, you may want to think about setting up a meeting with the physician in question. In fact, if all of your employees where reviewed, you may want to think about letting them all know about their review results. If at all possible though, especially when improvements need to be made, you should go over peer reviews in person. Should improvements need to be made, you can discuss those improvements, like being nicer to patients or working to improve wait times. You may also want to speak to the physician in question to see if they remembered the day that they underwent a physician peer review. You never really know, but they may have just been having a rare, bad day.

The above mentioned approaches are just a few of the many ways that you can go about handling a negative or poor physician peer review. As a reminder, you are advised to think positive; until you actually get the results, you never really know how well they may turn out.