Ann M. Coulston and Carol J. Boushey
See book keywords and concepts |
 Very low-calorie diets. JAMA 270, 967-974.
36. Saris, W. H. M. (2001). Very-low-calorie diets and sustained weight loss. Obes. Res. 9, 295S-301S.
37. Wadden, T. A. (1993). Treatment of obesity by moderate and severe caloric restriction. Results of clinical research trials. Ann. Intern. Med. 119, 688-693.
38. Anderson, J. W., Konz, E. C, Frederich, R. C, and Wood, C. L. (2001). Long-term weight-loss maintenance: a meta-analysis of U.S. studies. Am. J. Clin. Nutr. 74, 579-584.
39. Wing, R. R. (1992). Don't throw out the baby with the bathwater: a commentary on very-low-calorie diets. |
Andreas Moritz
See book keywords and concepts |
 Some low-calorie diets may not contain enough fat to enable the gallbladder to contract sufficiently to empty its bile. A meal or snack containing approximately 10 grams (one-third of an ounce) of fat is necessary for the gallbladder to contract normally. If this does not happen, the gallbladder retains the bile, which subsequently leads to stone formation.
Obesity is associated with increased cholesterol secretion into the bile ducts, which raises the risk of developing cholesterol stones. |
Tori Hudson, N.D.
See book keywords and concepts |
 When it comes to fertility, one study demonstrated that it did not matter whether the diet was high-carbohydrate or high-protein: both groups who stuck to low-calorie diets lost weight and had improved menstrual cycles and fertility.24'25
It is, of course, important to limit certain kinds of fish that have a higher mercury content in pregnancy, but evidence indicates it may be wise to do the same in cases of inferrility. Studies show that infertile couples consumed more fish and had higher levels of mercury in their blood rhan fertile couples. |
Jack Challem
See book keywords and concepts |
 Interestingly, people who are overweight but not prediabetic tend to lose more weight on high-carb but low-calorie diets. The long-term problem, however, is that high-carb diets will eventually cause prediabetes, at which point these people will do better on a low-carb, high-protein diet.
The Two Most Dangerous Food Additives
Two specific food additives may be largely responsible for the increasing numbers of people who are overweight, obese, prediabetic, and diabetic. These additives are high-fructose corn syrup and trans fats; uangers mat lutk ueyona l. |
| In contrast, simple low-calorie diets lead to a significant loss of muscle. Some of the protein you eat is used to make and maintain muscle, the tissue that most efficiently burns fat. Preserving your muscle mass becomes especially important after age forty, when age-related muscle loss accelerates. Physical activity also helps to make and maintain muscle.
• Protein does not increase the risk of developing heart disease. |
Wendy Bazilian, DRPH, MA, RD, Steven Pratt, MD, Kathy Matthews
See book keywords and concepts |
 One scientific review that examined a host of studies on the effects of low-calorie diets on hunger, weight loss, and manipulation of macronutrients, found that subjects experienced triple the weight loss when their diet was both low in fat and high in fiber. This result was found when those diets were compared with diets that were only low in fat.48 The clear message is that diets that are both high in fiber with an appropriate amount of healthy fat—like the SuperFoodsRx Diet—are ultimately more effective for achieving permanent weight loss. |
| Not only do oats and their sidekicks help sustain weight loss, they also provide important nutrients that are critical to health but are sometimes squeezed out of some low-calorie diets.65 The low-carb diet craze of recent years has confused many people about the role of grains in their weight-reducing plan. In fact, research shows that whole grains make a critical contribution to successful weight loss for all the reasons outlined above. |
Jack Challem
See book keywords and concepts |
| As we explained in our discussion of protein in chapter 4, however, protein-rich eating habits do a better job of preserving muscle mass in comparison with simple low-calorie diets.
Protein-rich diets can also help to preserve bone mass and bone density, as long as the diet includes large amounts of vegetables and fruits.
Protein is necessary for the formation of both muscle and bone, and eating vegetables and fruit counteracts any potential negative impact from consuming large amounts of protein. |
Dr. Steven R. Gundry
See book keywords and concepts |
 Mice on low-calorie diets that don't exercise look exactly like mice that consume more calories but burn them up with exercise. However, the calorie-restricted rodents still live longer than those that work out regularly on their mouse wheels.4 The evidence is overwhelming: If you consume fewer calories, you'll live longer. People who live to be 100 or more typically lose weight progressively after age 30, as their muscle mass diminishes, until they get to roughly what they weighed at about age 13, right before puberty reared its hormone-wracking head. |
Elaine Magee
See book keywords and concepts |
 One particularly interesting study at Tufts observed what happened when 43 people consumed low-calorie diets with or without oats for 6 weeks. To control results, the researchers provided the participants with all their food and caloric beverages. The study began with a 2-week weight-maintenance phase, followed by a 6-week weight-loss phase. During the weight-loss phase, one group consumed oats with every meal, while the other did not. |
| High-calcium, low-calorie diets have been shown to help reduce body fat and preserve muscle mass, but some experts suspect that other components besides calcium in dairy products aid the effort. In recent clinical trials of people receiving comparable low-fat diets—one with calcium from dairy products and the other from supplements—those taking supplements lost less weight and body fat.
One theory is that two milk proteins, casein and whey, represent the ideal combination of fast and slow proteins. I bet you didn't know protein could be fast or slow, did you? |
Ann M. Coulston and Carol J. Boushey
See book keywords and concepts |
| The effectiveness of low-fat, low-calorie diets in combination with lifestyle counseling and activity has been demonstrated in multicenter clinical trials where, in addition to 5% to 10% weight loss, the reduction or prevention of comorbidities such as diabetes or hypertension has also occurred [49-52]. |
| In the early 1900s semi-starvation or low-calorie diets controlled overproduction of glucose. The amount of carbohydrate in the diet depended on the severity of diabetes and was tailored to the individual utilization rate [49]. Dietary patterns were low in carbohydrate and very high in fat as an energy fuel. Adhering to these diets was difficult, and semistarvation could only be followed for a limited time.
Following the availability of insulin and oral agents for the treatment of diabetes, food energy restriction and the carbohydrate content of the diet have been greatly relaxed. |
Andreas Moritz
See book keywords and concepts |
| Lowfat and other low-calorie diets are damaging to one's health and should be prescribed only, if at all, in acute liver and gallbladder disorders where the digestion and absorption of fat are severely disrupted. After all gallstones are removed and liver functions are normalized, it is necessary to gradually increase fat and calorie consumption to meet the high-energy demands of the human body. The presence of gallstones in the liver and gallbladder impairs the body's ability to properly digest fat and other kinds of high-energy food. |
Dr. Steven R. Gundry
See book keywords and concepts |
| But if calorie optimization is so good for you, why are stress hormones such as Cortisol and epinephrine (adrenaline) elevated in animals on low-calorie diets? Only now are researchers beginning to understand that calorie optimization is a hormetic stressor that activates an animal's ancient genetic programming to increase its chances of survival under adverse conditions.1,4'6 Limiting calories makes the animal's genes circle the wagons to protect and preserve the species. |
Jonny Bowden, M.A., C.N.S.
See book keywords and concepts |
 After a year of unsuccessful results with traditional low-calorie diets, he decided to investigate alternative methods. He took himself to the American Museum of Natural History, and using teeth as an indicator of both body condition in general and diet specifically, he hit the mother lode when he looked at skeletons dug from Inuit burial grounds. Looking further into Inuit diets, he consulted with Vilhjalmur Stefansson and became convinced that a meat-only diet was the answer for his obese patients. |
Byron J. Richards
See book keywords and concepts |
 All their friends are sure they eat junk in private, but these people tend to have almost perfect low-calorie diets. They know that if they begin to eat even the slightest amount of extra food they will begin to gain weight, and once that process is in motion they may gain twenty or thirty pounds before they can bring the weight gain to a stop. |
by Michael Murray, N.D. and Joseph Pizzorno, N.D.
See book keywords and concepts |
| One of the big reason why the Atkins diet is so attractive to dieters who have tried unsuccessfully to lose weight on low-fat, low-calorie diets is that while on the Atkins program dieters can eat as many calories as desired from protein and fat, as long as carbohydrate consumption is restricted. As a result, many Atkins dieters are spared the feelings of hunger and deprivation that accompany other weight loss regimens. However, we simply do not agree that such a diet is conducive to long-term good health. |
Jonny Bowden, M.A., C.N.S.
See book keywords and concepts |
| Groves devotes his site to "exposing dietary and medical misinformation" about such things as low-calorie diets, fats, cholesterol, heart disease, and other "dietary and medical bits and bobs." The (long) article titled "The Cholesterol Myth," copiously referenced, is a highlight. Highly recommended: www.second-opinions.co.uk
Vitamins and Supplements
I once worked in a doctor's office that had the following sign posted:
The top three things not to bargain shop for:
Parachutes
Scuba Equipment
Vitamins
All vitamin and supplements are not created equal. |
| Alfred Pennington and entrusted him with the job of finding out why the traditional low-calorie diets of the time were bombing when it came to losing weight. Pennington applied his considerable brain power to an analysis of the scientific literature and came to the conclusion that our old friend—the formerly fat undertaker William Banting—was right all along: obesity was due not to overeating, but instead to the body's inability to use carbohydrates for anything other than making fat.
Pennington put the DuPont executives on a high-fat, high-protein, low-carbohydrate, unrestricted-calorie diet. |
Russell L. Blaylock, M.D.
See book keywords and concepts |
 So the whole effect of low-calorie diets may be related to decreasing metabolism and, therefore, a better way to increase longevity is to improve the body's antioxidant defenses rather than dramatically and dangerously lowering nutrient intake.
Along this same line, but less well-known, is the observation that low-protein diets also increase longevity and high-protein diets are linked to shortened life spans. If confirmed, this finding could diminish the popularity of the high-protein diets being advocated by some popular authors. |
Neal D. Barnard and Bryanna Clark Grogan
See book keywords and concepts |
 Most had tried many different diets: low-calorie diets, low-carb diets, Weight Watchers, the cabbage-soup diet, and just about everything else. Like most people, they had found these diets tough to follow, and whatever weight they lost soon returned.
Our approach was very different. It did not include calorie counting, limits on portions or carbohydrates, or even an exercise prescription. For research purposes, we wanted to isolate the effects of diet.
The participants lost weight easily, averaging about 1 pound per week—week after week after week. |
Michael Friedman, ND
See book keywords and concepts |
 Golay et al compared the effects of two low-calorie diets of similar caloric value, but differing in carbohydrate content (25% versus 45% of calories from carbohydrates) for 12 weeks. Although both diets resulted in improvement, the fasting blood insulin decreased more markedly with the 25% carbohydrate diet compared to the 45% carbohydrate diet. The researchers also found a slightly greater degree of average weight loss (10.2 kg with the 25% carbohydrate diet versus 8.6 kg with the 45% carbohydrate diet), and adipose tissue loss (8.1 kg with the 25% carbohydrate diet versus 7. |
Elson M. Haas, M.D.
See book keywords and concepts |
 These pre-packaged, high-protein, low-calorie diets allow patients to burn more fat. Although these programs are not nearly as healthful as vital juice fasts, they are more nutritionally supportive over a longer period of time and can be used on an outpatient basis fairly safely if people are monitored regularly. They provide all the needed vitamins, minerals, and amino acids to sustain life while helping many people lower their weight, blood fats, blood pressure, and blood sugars. |
Carol Krucoff and Mitchell Krucoff, M.D.
See book keywords and concepts |
 Yet many "exercise-phobes" try to create the calorie deficit solely through extremely low-calorie diets, which is a dangerous mistake that can harm health and is unlikely to result in permanent weight loss.
"People who are overweight want to lose fat," notes exercise physiologist Steve Farrell of the Cooper Institute for Aerobics Research in Dallas. "But many don't realize that about half of the weight lost on extremely low-calorie diets isn't from fat, it's from lean tissue. |
Kevin Trudeau
See book keywords and concepts |
 Bread, for some reason, has become a no-no for low-calorie diets due to the ignorance of the diet inventors over the past two decades.
The bread my wife produced was a very tasty bread to say the least. We started to include it in our regular diet, and we did start feeling better, possibly from the combination of the nutritional value and the fact that a high-fiber diet aids regularity, which more and more tests are proving to be a valid factor for good health. But, unexpectedly, something else happened. For some reason, when we ate the bread, we lost our appetite. |
Bradley J. Willcox, M.D., D. Craig Willcox, Ph.D., Makoto Suzuki, M.D.
See book keywords and concepts |
 So there seems to be an interesting paradox: low-calorie diets increase stress hormone levels, which leads to decreased risk for stress-associated injury to the brain and other tissues. More research is needed, but chances are good that the explanation lies in either an anti-inflammatory response to the stress hormones or a longer-term reduction of cell-damaging free radicals.
ANTI-INFLAMMATION
Inflammation plays a key role in the chronic diseases of aging, such as coronary heart disease, stroke, and cancer, as well as in aging itself. |
volker schulz and Rudolf Hansel
See book keywords and concepts |
 Besides its use as an antidiarrheal, carob seed meal is also used as a component of low-calorie diets.
Suggested Formulations
Antidiarrheal tea
Rx
Black tea leaves 40.0
Balm leaves 20.0
Fennelseed, crushed 20.0
Centaury 20.0 Mix to make tea
Directions: Prepare 2 teaspoons in 1 cup as an infusion; steep 10-20 min.
|!*^| References
Anonymus (1994) Anwendung von Uzarabei unspezifischen Durchfallerkrankungen. Wissenschaftlicher Abschlufibericht, STADA Arzneimittel AG. Blumenthal M, Hall T, Goldberg A. (eds.) (2003) The ABC Clinical Guide to Herbs. Austin, Tex:
American Botanical Council. |
Patrick Holford
See book keywords and concepts |
 When animals are given very high-quality, low-calorie diets, this is exactly what is achieved. They receive exactly what they need in the way of fuel, so there is no wasted "burning" by the body—this process is the major generator of free radicals, the toxic by-product of energy metabolism. By being provided with optimum nutrition, especially a high intake of antioxidant nutrients, the animals have both maximum protection from free radicals and all the cofactor nutrients necessary to make sure that energy metabolism takes place as efficiently as possible. |
| The best results in research studies have consistently been achieved by giving animals low-calorie diets high in antioxidant nutrients—in other words, exactly what they need and no more. This reduces "oxidative stress" and ensures maximum antioxidant protection. Animals fed in this way not only live up to 40 percent longer, but also are more active during their lives. Although long-term studies have yet to be completed, there is every reason to assume that the same principles apply to humans. |
Email this page to a friend
