People diagnosed with diabetes are often told to eliminate sugar-sweetened soda and desserts from their diet. But people can work with a diabetes educator to develop an eating plan that includes these and other favorite foods, albeit in limited amounts, experts say.

Maggie Powers, president-elect of health care and education for the American Diabetes Association, tells The New York Times physicians can play a greater role in helping diabetics learn to manage their condition through changes in diet.

Doctors, she notes, can refer patients to a diabetes education program or nutritionist to help figure out a workable diet plan.

“It’s a matter of give-and-take,” Dr. Powers said. “If somebody wants [sugar-sweetened] soda, we don’t encourage that, because a little bit gives you a lot of carbohydrates.”

But, she added: “If you say that you have to have a brownie every Sunday before you go to bed, I’d say, ‘You typically have a snack of 30 grams of carbohydrates, such as a large apple or banana; you can have a brownie instead.’ ”

The concern is that too many high-carb sweets and snacks will displace nutritious carbohydrates like fruits, vegetables, cereals, whole grains, and dried beans such as chickpeas, kidney beans or lentils. A can of Mountain Dew, for instance, has 46 grams of carbohydrates — about the same as two pieces of bread (26 grams) and an apple (21 grams).

Dr. Powers, a clinician and scientist with the International Diabetes Center at Park Nicollet in Minneapolis, teaches a carbohydrate management method that distributes carbs throughout the day, taking food intake, exercise, diabetes medications and insulin production into account.