Category: Weight Loss

There is evidence that higher levels of this vitamin leads to weight loss.

Higher levels of vitamin D in the body are linked to weight loss, studies find.

People lose more weight and belly fat when their vitamin D intake is higher.

A study has shown that people drinking more milk can even double weight loss.

Milk contains both calcium and vitamin D, which have both been linked to weight loss by multiple studies.

Another study has found that people with high vitamin D levels lose 20 pounds more when they are dieting than those with lower levels.

Up to 50 percent of the world’s population may be deficient in vitamin D.

People get much of the vitamin D they require from its production in the skin, which is carried out in response to sunlight.

Diet can also provide vitamin D — it is found in high levels in foods like eggs and oily fish.

Studies in rats have found that they burn more calories when they are given large doses of vitamin D.

One analysis of around 165,000 people has found that a 10 percent rise in body weight is linked to a 4 percent drop in vitamin D levels.

The study suggests that the increase in weight leads to a drop in vitamin D levels.

There was evidence that higher vitamin D levels lead to weight loss, although the effect may be small.

Nevertheless, a drop in vitamin D levels in obese people puts them at an additional health risk.

Dr Elina Hypponen, study co-author, said:

“Vitamin D deficiency is an active health concern around the world.

While many health messages have focused on a lack of sun exposure or excessive use of suncreams, we should not forget that vitamin D deficiency is also caused by obesity.

Our study highlights the importance of monitoring and treating vitamin D deficiency in people who are overweight or obese, in order to alleviate adverse health effects caused by a lack of vitamin D.”

The study was published in the journal PLOS Medicine (Vimaleswaran et al., 2013).

Weekly injection of this anti-obesity medication could lead to a weight loss of 37 lb (17 kg).

Semaglutide, sold under the brand name Ozempic, could be an effective weight loss medication.

It has been sold in the U.S as an anti-diabetic medication, but the drug appears to have a remarkable weight loss effect when combined with intensive behavioral therapy (IBT) and a low-calorie diet.

A 68 week weight loss trial found that injection of 2.4 mg of semaglutide per week along with a low-calorie diet for the first 8 weeks and 30 sessions of IBT led to obese patients losing 16 percent of their weight.

This is a phase 3 clinical trial confirming the large weight loss effect by semaglutide when given as an anti-obesity medication to patients.

In a previous trial, participants who were obese or overweight received a 2.4 mg dose of semaglutide once-weekly alongside a low-calorie diet and increased physical activity.

Participants, on average, lost over 15 kg and more than 30 percent of people lost one-fifth of their weight — an equivalent of 20 percent.

With obesity approaching 50 percent of the U.S. adult population, these findings on weight management could improve many people’s lives if followed correctly by the health care system.

For the recent study, 611 obese adults with an average weight of 233 pounds (106 kg) and a body mass index (BMI) of 38 took a 68-week weight loss treatment.

At the end of the study period, participants who received weekly a 2.4 mg dose of semaglutide along with a low-calorie diet plus IBT lost 17 kg while those who received a low-calorie diet plus IBT but no drug lost only 6 kg.

The low-calorie diet plan consisted of meal-replacement foods (shakes, bars, and prepared meals) providing 1,000 to 1,200 kcal a day.

Professor Thomas Wadden, the study’s first author, said:

“We wanted to induce a large weight loss with rigorous behavioral therapy and see how much additional weight loss semaglutide could add.

These are remarkable weight losses, particularly the one third of participants who lost 20 percent of baseline weight, a reduction that approaches that achieved with sleeve gastrectomy, a widely used bariatric surgery procedure.”

The semaglutide group who had greater weight loss also saw more improvement in their cardiometabolic health, such as reduced blood pressure, triglycerides, blood sugar levels, and waist circumference.

Professor Timothy Garvey, study co-author, said:

“These metabolic benefits and marked improvements in risk factors hold great promise for the prevention and treatment of diabetes and cardiovascular disease.

The unprecedented degree of weight loss is also sufficient to prevent and treat other complications of obesity including osteoarthritis, sleep apnea, and non-alcoholic fatty liver disease.”

The higher dose of semaglutide at 2.4 mg seems to influence the brain’s appetite centre by reducing hunger and increasing the feeling of fullness consequently leading to eating less and so weight loss.

The study was published in the JAMA (Wadden et al., 2021).

It may be effective because it helps to regulate glucose levels.

A few cups of green tea each day is linked to weight loss, research finds.

Four cups of green tea was linked to 5.5 pounds of weight loss in eight weeks by one study.

Even two cups per day can be enough to shed a few pounds.

People lose weight drinking green tea in these studies without making other changes to their diet or exercise.

Restricting calories and/or adding more exercise will help to boost weight loss even more.

Green tea may be effective because it helps to regulate glucose levels.

The active ingredient is a type of flavonoid called gallated catechins, also known as EGCG.

Green tea can also help slow down weight gain, researchers have found.

One recent study on mice being fed a high-fat diet also gave them 2 percent green tea.

The results showed they put on 20 percent less weight in comparison to those not fed the green tea extract.

Professor Richard Bruno, study co-author, said:

“This study provides evidence that green tea encourages the growth of good gut bacteria, and that leads to a series of benefits that significantly lower the risk of obesity.”

The mice given the green tea extract also had better gut health and lower insulin resistance.

Professor Bruno said:

“The results of studies looking at obesity management so far have been a real mixed bag.

Some seem to support green tea for weight loss, but a lot of other research has shown no effect, likely due to the complexity of the diet relative to a number of lifestyle factors.”

Drinking green tea could help people lose weight, said Professor Bruno said:

“Two-thirds of American adults are overweight or obese, and we know that just telling people to eat less and exercise more isn’t working.

It’s important to establish complementary health-promoting approaches that can prevent obesity and related problems,”

The study was published in the The Journal of Nutritional Biochemistry (Chung et al., 2019).

This technique also helps people keep weight off.

A 14-day break from dieting helps increase weight loss by 50 percent, research finds.

People who take a break from dieting for a couple of weeks also find it easier to maintain their weight loss over the long term.

Having a break from a weight loss diet is beneficial because the body naturally gets used to lower levels of calories during dieting.

This causes a slowing of the metabolism.

However, taking a break brings the metabolism up to the normal rate again, increasing the rate at which calories are burned.

Professor Nuala Byrne, the study’s first author, explained:

“When we reduce our energy (food) intake during dieting, resting metabolism decreases to a greater extent than expected; a phenomenon termed ‘adaptive thermogenesis’ — making weight loss harder to achieve.

This ‘famine reaction’, a survival mechanism which helped humans to survive as a species when food supply was inconsistent in millennia past, is now contributing to our growing waistlines when the food supply is readily available.”

The study included 51 men who were either dieting continually or who took two-week breaks.

The research was set up in such a way that both groups dieted the same amount in total.

At the end of the study, men taking a two-week break had lost 30 pounds in comparison to 20 pounds in the continuous dieting group.

Intermittent dieting also enabled men to maintain 18 pounds more weight loss than those who dieted continuously.

Professor Byrne said that shorter breaks from dieting, though, are not as effective:

“There is a growing body of research which has shown that diets which use one to seven day periods of complete or partial fasting alternated with ad libitum food intake, are not more effective for weight loss than conventional continuous dieting.

It seems that the ‘breaks’ from dieting we have used in this study may be critical to the success of this approach.

While further investigations are needed around this intermittent dieting approach, findings from this study provide preliminary support for the model as a superior alternative to continuous dieting for weight loss.”

The study was published in the International Journal of Obesity (Byrne et al., 2018).

Stop food cravings with these ten simple tips based on the psychological research.

1. Tap your forehead

Anything that will distract you from thinking about food cravings will work.

One study has even found that tapping your forehead with your index finger can do the trick.

Just don’t let the tapping turn into punching — you’re not supposed to draw blood, no matter how strong the cravings get!

2. Change how you think

A slightly deeper psychological approach is to start thinking differently.

Take a moment to consider the long-term consequences of eating the wrong foods.

Dr Kathryn Demos, one of the authors of a study which tested this approach on food cravings, explained:

“We found that simply thinking in a different way affects how the brain responds to tempting food cues in individuals with obesity.

Through the MRI scans we identified that thinking about the long-term negative impact of eating unhealthy foods increased activity in a region of the brain involved in inhibitory control and self-regulation.

Our results show the promising possibility that focusing on the long-term consequences of consuming unhealthy foods could help diminish cravings and, as a result, potentially enhance weight-loss efforts.”

3. Play Tetris to stop food cravings

Just three minutes of playing Tetris can reduce cravings for food, cigarettes and alcohol, according to a study published in the journal Appetite.

The psychologists concluded that Tetris, a retro tile-matching puzzle game, may provide a visual distraction which helps people control their cravings.

4. Use your imagination

Try thinking about how a rainbow looks or the smell of eucalyptus.

Or even stare at a random pattern of dots — the kind you get if you pull the aerial out of the TV.

All have been found to reduce the vividness of food cravings.

That study’s authors explain that:

“…engaging in a simple visual task seems to hold real promise as a method for curbing food cravings.

…real-world implementations could incorporate the dynamic visual noise display into existing accessible technologies, such as the smart phone and other mobile, hand-held computing devices.”

Your imagination can be a powerful ally in the fight against food cravings.

5. Look at loads of pictures of food

It’s the most unlikely weight-loss trick ever: looking at endless pictures of foods can make them less enjoyable to eat, a recent study has found.

While a few photos might enhance the appetite, contrary to what you’d expect, people are actually put off the taste by looking at loads of pictures of food.

6. Go for a walk to stop food cravings

A 15-minute walk is enough to stop food cravings brought on by stressful situations, a study has found.

The authors concluded:

“Short bouts of physical activity may reduce the craving for sugary snacks in overweight people.

When snacking has become habitual and poorly regulated by overweight people, the promotion of short bouts of physical activity could be valuable for reducing the urge to consume at times when the person may be particularly vulnerable, such as during stress and when snack foods are available.”

7. Protein-rich breakfast

Research shows that eating a good breakfast — particularly one rich in protein — boosts a critical neurotransmitter, which may lower food cravings later in the day.

Dr. Heather Leidy, an assistant professor of nutrition and exercise physiology who led the study, said:

“Our research showed that people experience a dramatic decline in cravings for sweet foods when they eat breakfast.

However, breakfasts that are high in protein also reduced cravings for savory — or high-fat — foods.

On the other hand, if breakfast is skipped, these cravings continue to rise throughout the day.”

8. Stop food cravings with chewing gum

It’s an old trick, but one that can work.

It may not look good chewing gum, but some studies suggest it can reduce the intake of snacks.

Dr. Paula J Geiselman who has conducted a study on this, explained that her research…

“…demonstrates the potential role chewing gum can play in appetite control, reduction of snack cravings and weight management.

Even small changes in calories can have an impact in the long term.

And, this research supports the role of chewing gum as an easy, practical tool for managing snack, especially sweet snack, intake and cravings.”

9. Less food cravings from sleeping well

People who are short of sleep find it difficult to resist temptations, one study has found.

Matthew Walker, one of its authors, explained:

“What we have discovered is that high-level brain regions required for complex judgments and decisions become blunted by a lack of sleep, while more primal brain structures that control motivation and desire are amplified.”

In other words, being short of sleep = desire for sugary snacks.

10. Pay attention to your emotions

Tuning in to your emotions is an important step in managing food cravings.

One study has found that people lose more weight when they learn to get in touch with their feelings about food.

That study’s authors concluded:

“With a better understanding of how they feel and how to use emotions to make better decisions, people will not only eat better, they will also likely be happier and healthier because they relate better to others and are more concerned with their overall well-being.”

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Belly fat is the fat that surrounds the vital organs, deep in the belly.

Foods containing fibre, like fruit and vegetables, can help to reduce weight and belly fat, research finds.

Supplementation with psyllium, which is full of fibre and available as a supplement, can also reduce belly fat.

Adding as little as 10 grams of soluble fibre per day has been shown to reduce belly fat by 4 percent.

Exercise on top increases this figure to 7 percent.

Belly fat is the fat that surrounds the vital organs, deep in the belly.

Unfortunately, there is no miracle food that can reduce belly fat on its own.

However, eating a heart-healthy diet high in fibre can help to reduce abdominal fat.

Fibre helps to reduce belly fat by turning to a gel during digestion.

As a result people feel more full, among other benefits, stopping from eating more.

One type of food that contains high amounts of fibre is psyllium, a plant sometimes used as a food ingredient.

A study has tested the effects of psyllium supplementation on visceral or belly fat.

The research included 45 health adolescents who were given 6g per day of psyllium or a placebo.

The adolescents made no other changes to their diet or lifestyle.

After six weeks, the results showed that supplementation with psyllium had reduced belly fat and decreased levels of ‘bad’ cholesterol.

The study’s authors describe the results:

“Our data show that even in the context of a relatively short intervention, psyllium supplementation improves LDL cholesterol and android fat to gynoid fat ratio [in other words, it reduced belly fat].

Our study corroborates previous data showing that psyllium has lipid lowering properties in children and adolescents.

The 6% improvement in LDL cholesterol concentrations we observed is comparable to other studies that have shown improvements of 0–23% using psyllium doses ranging from 5–25 g/day.”

The study was published in the journal PLoS One (de Bock et al., 2012).

Around one-third of people over 65 are overweight or obese.

Bursts of short, high-intensity exercise can triple weight loss, research finds.

Known as ‘interval training’, or HIIT, the exercise can burn off more calories in a shorter period of time.

The exercises involved do not require any special equipment and can all be done at home in less than half an hour.

They include things like ‘jumping jacks’, squats, step ups and push ups.

Common types of interval training involve 30-second bursts going “all out” followed by four minutes of recovery at a much lower intensity.

Interval training can also be done on a bicycle, by running, jogging, speed walking or with a variety of other exercises.

The study included 36 people aged 70 with visceral (belly) fat exceeding 1 pound in women and 4 pounds in men.

They followed a 10-week course of interval training.

The interval training started at just 18 minutes per day, three times per week.

It involved 40 seconds of work, followed by 20 seconds of rest.

Over the 10 weeks of the study, they worked up to 36-minute workouts per day.

The results showed that the interval training tripled the losses in belly fat, in comparison to a control group who did not exercise.

The effects of exercise were stronger for men than for women in this study.

The study’s authors conclude:

“In conclusion, the main finding of this trial is that 10 weeks of progressive vigorous interval training decreased total FM [fat mass] by almost threefold compared to the control group while increasing muscle mass.

These outcomes are previously known to be associated with improved cardiometabolic health and decreased risk of CVDs.”

Around one-third of people over 65 are overweight or obese.

Obesity increases the risk of a range of diseases, including cardiovascular disease, type 2 diabetes, high blood pressure and osteoarthritis.

The study was published in the Journal of the American Geriatrics Society (Ballin et al., 2019).

Around one-in-three adults in the US are obese.

White mulberry, which is a herb, may boost weight loss, research finds.

It can also lower blood pressure and decrease ‘bad’ cholesterol.

A natural compound called ‘rutin’ contained in mulberries can activate brown fat in the body, which helps burn calories.

Brown fat is usually activated by cold weather, but rutin can also activate it.

The job of brown fat, sometimes known as ‘good fat’, is to convert food into heat.

Consuming mulberries, therefore, may help people burn more calories.

Another benefit of rutin is that it helps to balance blood glucose.

The leaves of mulberries — whether red or white — can be bought dried to have as a tea.

Alternatively, the mulberry fruit can be added to the diet.

Doses that have been tested in humans range from 1g to 3g of the powdered leaves per day taken for around a month.

For the study, scientists added 1 mg of rutin to the drinking water of obese mice.

The results showed that rutin activated brown fat, which helped the mice burn more calories and reduce their fat.

Dr Wan-Zhu Jin, study co-author, said:

“The beneficial effects of rutin on BAT-mediated metabolic improvement have evoked a substantial interest in the potential treatment for obesity and its related diseases, such as diabetes.

In line with this idea, discovery of more safe and effective BAT activators is desired to deal with obesity and its related diseases.”

A few other studies have found benefits for rutin.

One study found that white mulberry may help lower blood sugar in people with type 2 diabetes.

People in this study took 1 g of powdered leaf three times a day for a month.

Another study found that the same dosage increased ‘good’ cholesterol levels by 18 percent and reduced ‘bad’ cholesterol levels by 23 percent.

The study was published in The FASEB Journal (Yuan et al., 2016).

The technique helps to break down fats, effectively melting them away.

The best way to shed belly fat is through exercise, a study finds.

More belly fat is lost by people doing exercise than those taking medications designed for weight loss.

A molecule called interleukin-6 is released by exercise.

This helps to break down fats, effectively melting them away.

Dr Anne-Sophie Wedell-Neergaard, the study’s first author, said:

“The take home for the general audience is ‘do exercise’.

We all know that exercise promotes better health, and now we also know that regular exercise training reduces abdominal fat mass and thereby potentially also the risk of developing cardio-metabolic diseases.”

The research included 53 people who exercised for 45 minutes, several times a week.

The results showed that belly fat was reduced by an average of 8 percent in those who did exercise.

Some people were given a drug that blocks the action of interleukin-6.

The results showed that this group put on weight, suggesting that interleukin-6 is important for weight loss.

Dr Wedell-Neergaard said:

“To our knowledge, this is the first study to show that interleukin-6 has a physiological role in regulating visceral fat mass in humans.”

Unfortunately, there is no food or combination of foods, that have been found to get rid of belly fat.

However, diet and exercise can both help.

Eating healthily is also beneficial for general health, reducing the risk of dementia, cancer and other diseases.

Dr Wedell-Neergaard said:

“It is important to stress that when you start exercising, you may increase body weight due to increased muscle mass.

So, in addition to measuring your overall body weight, it would be useful, and maybe more important, to measure waist circumference to keep track of the loss of visceral fat mass and to stay motivated.”

The study was published in the journal Cell Metabolism (Wedell-Neergaard et al., 2018).

This vital weight loss technique is nothing to do with diet and exercise.

Learning to love your body, however it looks, can triple weight loss efforts, research finds.

Dieters in the study learned to be less concerned about their size and weight and other people’s opinions of them.

They were also encouraged to think that how their body looks is not as important as they think.

Happily, the researchers found, people with an improved body image, automatically eat more healthily.

The study shows that hating your own body is one of the biggest barriers to weight loss.

It is well-known that people who are overweight often have body image problems.

Overcoming these problems — especially worrying about what other people think — is hugely beneficial to weight loss.

For the study, 239 overweight women followed a standard program of diet and exercise for one year.

Half were given a special course designed to improve their body image.

This included sessions on the emotional aspects of losing weight.

This is because some overweight people tend towards emotional eating.

Emotional eating means that negative moods trigger bouts of eating to feel better, rather than eating to satiate hunger.

The women were also encouraged to love their bodies, whatever its size and shape.

The results showed that those who improved their body image lost an average of 7 percent — more than triple the weight loss of the control group.

Dr Pedro Teixeira, study co-author, said:

“Body image problems are very common amongst overweight and obese people, often leading to comfort eating and more rigid eating patterns, and are obstacles to losing weight.

Our results showed a strong correlation between improvements in body image, especially in reducing anxiety about other people’s opinions, and positive changes in eating behavior.

From this we believe that learning to relate to your body in healthier ways is an important aspect of maintaining weight loss and should be addressed in every weight control program.”

The study was published in the International Journal of Behavioral Nutrition and Physical Activity (Carraça et al., 2011).