Category: Weight Loss

Around 40 percent of the world’s population is overweight.

Depression is one of the biggest barriers to weight loss, new research finds.

Carrying an extra 20 pounds in weight increases the risk of depression by 17 percent, the study found.

The more fat someone carries, the greater the chance they will experience depression.

In this case, depression is driven by low self-esteem and a poor body image.

Since depression involves a loss of motivation and disinterest in life, it makes it much harder for overweight people who are depressed to lose weight.

Dr Søren Dinesen Østergaard, study co-author, said:

“Our study also indicated that the location of the fat on the body makes no difference to the risk of depression.

This suggests that it is the psychological consequences of being overweight or obese which lead to the increased risk of depression, and not the direct biological effect of the fat.”

The conclusions come from an analysis of over three-quarters of a million people, sourced partly from the UK biobank.

The biobank is a long-term project that tracks the health and well-being of volunteers in the UK.

The results suggest that it is obesity that leads to depression, Dr Østergaard said:

“As it appears to be the psychological consequences of obesity, such as a negative body image and low self-esteem that is the main driving force behind the increased risk of depression, society’s efforts to combat obesity must not stigmatise, as this will probably increase the risk of depression even further.

It is important to bear this in mind so we can avoid doing more harm than good in the effort to curb the obesity epidemic.”

Around 40 percent of the world’s population is overweight, Dr Østergaard said.

The study was published in the journal Translational Psychiatry (Speed et al., 2019).

This vitamin causes weight loss by converting “bad” white fat tissue into “good” brown fat to generate heat in cold weather.

Vitamin A could be a good treatment candidate for obesity due to its ability to switch white fat tissue to brown fat.

A study reveals that the mount of vitamin A increases when a person is exposed to cold conditions.

Vitamin A is involved in “fat transformation” a process where “bad” white fat is converted to “good” brown adipose tissue.

The body will use this type of fat for producing energy and heat, therefore the increased transformation of fat by vitamin A can be used as a new promising way for weight loss and treating obesity.

White and brown fat cells are two types of fat in mammals, including humans.

The white one is the body’s energy storage in the form of fat mostly found in the upper thighs, the abdominal and bottom area.

Brown fat is found in small deposits, used for producing energy and heat, mainly around the shoulders, neck, and kidneys.

Eating too much and inactivity cause our body to store the extra calories in white fat but if this type of fat is converted into brown fat then there is a chance to avoid obesity or even gaining weight.

Dr Florian Kiefer and his team show that exposure to cold increases the retinol-binding protein that transports vitamin A in the blood.

Vitamin A is usually stored in the liver but instead the application of cold pushes vitamin A to relocate towards the adipose tissue known as body fat.

This process causes white fat to turn to “browning” leading to a larger amount of fat burning and so weight lose.

The research team noticed that by blocking retinol-binding protein in mice, both vitamin A mediated by cold and conversion of the white fat to the brown fat were reduced.

Dr Kiefer explained:

“As a consequence, fat oxidation and heat production were perturbed so that the mice were no longer able to protect themselves against the cold.

In contrast, the addition of vitamin A to human white fat cells led to the expression of brown fat cell characteristics, with increased metabolic activity and energy consumption.”

However, vitamin A supplementation requires clinical supervision as excessive vitamin A intake has serious side effects.

Dr Kiefer said:

“Our results show that vitamin A plays an important role in the function of adipose tissue and affects global energy metabolism.

However, this is not an argument for consuming large amounts of vitamin A supplements if not prescribed, because it is critical that vitamin A is transported to the right cells at the right time.

We have discovered a new mechanism by which vitamin A regulates lipid combustion and heat generation in cold conditions.

This could help us to develop new therapeutic interventions that exploit this specific mechanism.”

The study was published in the journal Molecular Metabolism (Fenzl et al., 2020).

The top tips for either diet — whether low-carb or low-fat — were to eat less refined flour and less sugar.

Both a low-fat and a low-carbohydrate approach boost weight loss, recent research finds.

Both diets are similarly effective, with people in the study losing an average of 13 pounds in one year.

The top tips for either diet — whether low-carb or low-fat — were to eat less refined flour and less sugar.

More fruit and vegetables and more whole foods also help to boost weight loss.

Professor Christopher Gardner, the study’s first author, said:

“We’ve all heard stories of a friend who went on one diet — it worked great — and then another friend tried the same diet, and it didn’t work at all.

It’s because we’re all very different, and we’re just starting to understand the reasons for this diversity.

Maybe we shouldn’t be asking what’s the best diet, but what’s the best diet for whom?”

The study included 609 people aged 18 to 50 who were all overweight.

Half were put on a low-fat diet, the rest on a low-carb diet.

The emphasis was on a high-quality low-fat or low-carb diet, said Professor Gardner:

“We made sure to tell everybody, regardless of which diet they were on, to go to the farmer’s market, and don’t buy processed convenience food crap.

Also, we advised them to diet in a way that didn’t make them feel hungry or deprived — otherwise it’s hard to maintain the diet in the long run.

We wanted them to choose a low-fat or low-carb diet plan that they could potentially follow forever, rather than a diet that they’d drop when the study ended.”

After 12 months, the results showed that both groups had lost an average of 13 pounds.

Within this there was huge variation, with some dropping 60 pounds while a few gained 15 to 20 pounds.

However, it did not matter which diet people were on.

Professor Gardner said:

“On both sides, we heard from people who had lost the most weight that we had helped them change their relationship to food, and that now they were more thoughtful about how they ate.”

The study was published in JAMA (Gardner et al., 2018).

Eating chocolate at a certain time of the day can help with losing belly fat and lowering blood sugar levels.

Eating a high amount of chocolate in the first hour of the day could boost fat loss and lower blood sugar.

A study found that consuming 100 g of chocolate within an hour of waking up could help with burning fat, reduce blood glucose levels, and decrease daily cortisol levels (a stress hormone).

Milk chocolate, because of its high fat and sugar content, seems like a good recipe to put on weight, especially in postmenopausal women who are more likely to gain weight.

However, the current study suggests that the “timing” of chocolate intake affects microbiota composition and function, hunger, and fat burn.

For this study, 19 postmenopausal women were asked to consume 100 g of milk chocolate for 2 weeks either within an hour of waking up or within an hour before bedtime.

Weight gain and other factors such as blood glucose levels, hunger, and stress levels related to appetite were compared to a two-week period with no chocolate intake.

The results show that during the two weeks of chocolate intake women were less hungry, craving fewer sweets and so lost more weight.

Eating chocolate in the morning provided other benefits like reduced cortisol levels during the day and consequently lower stress-related appetite.

To some extent this may explain why those women when consuming chocolate in the morning showed better caloric compensation, adjusting their intake in response to changes in their daily calories.

The reduction in craving sweets might be due to longer satisfaction and improved mood from the release of endorphins in the brain.

A summary of the findings:

• Eating chocolate in the morning or in the evening didn’t cause any weight gain.
• Chocolate intake can influence microbiota composition, hunger and appetite, and sleep.
• Eating a fair amount of chocolate during breakfast time could help in losing belly fat and lower blood sugar levels.
• Eating chocolate in the morning prompted lipid oxidation (breaking down fatty acids) 26 percent more than evening intake.
• Eating chocolate in the evening prompted carbohydrate oxidation 35 percent higher than morning chocolate.

Dr Frank Scheer, the study’s senior author, said:

“Our findings highlight that not only ‘what’ but also ‘when’ we eat can impact physiological mechanisms involved in the regulation of body weight.”

Dr Marta Garaulet, study co-author, said:

“Our volunteers did not gain weight despite increasing caloric intake.

Our results show that chocolate reduced ad libitum energy intake, consistent with the observed reduction in hunger, appetite and the desire for sweets shown in previous studies.”

Past studies have suggested that dark chocolate can lower the craving for fatty foods, sweet, and salty treats due to increased satiety and reducing the desire to eat more.

The study was published in The FASEB Journal (Hernández‐González et al., 2021).

Some studies have suggested that one particular type of activity may be best for weight loss.

The best type of exercise for weight loss is the one that suits the individual, research suggests.

The study compared endurance exercise, strength training, a combination, or just trying to meet the weekly target for physical activity in whatever way works.

All three approaches produced a similar amount of weight loss, when combined with a low-calorie diet.

The results come from a study of 96 obese people who took part in a 22-week program.

Everyone in the study reduced their calorie intake while trying different types of exercise.

Some did endurance exercise like cycling, running or using a elliptical machine.

Some did strength training, such as bench presses, bicep curls and squats.

Still others did a combination of the two.

A comparison group were just told to stay active and meet the minimum activity guidelines.

These involve doing 30-60 minutes of moderate activity on most days of the week.

Things like taking the stairs and walking briskly would count.

The results showed that all the types of exercise and diet combinations reduced body weight, waistline, fat and increased lean muscle mass.

The authors write:

“The present study shows that, when adhered to alongside a hypocaloric diet, different exercise training programs (endurance, strength, or their combination) or the following of physical activity recommendations are equally efficient in terms of improving body weight and body composition variables in obesity management.”

One calorie burned in exercise is not the same as one not ingested.”

Other studies have suggested that one particular type of activity may be best for weight loss.

For example, one study found that jogging is the best exercise for those with a genetic susceptibility to weight gain.

A range of studies have found that high-intensity interval training (HIIT) is one of the best exercises for weight loss.

However, HIIT can be difficult for people to stick to.

In the end, the current study’s suggestion that it comes down to the individual is the best advice.

The study was published in the Journal of Applied Physiology (Benito et al., 2015).

Does the best way to lose weight involve intermittent fasting or reduced calories across all meals everyday?

Intermittent fasting is sometimes promoted as a magic bullet to lose weight.

However, a new study found that this method is not as effective as traditional daily calorie restriction plans.

Intermittent fasting is an umbrella term for dietary restriction plans that follows different meal timing schedules for a period of time.

The “5:2” diet, alternate-day fasting and time-restricted feeding are examples.

In the past few years, fasting diets have become more popular with images of celebrities showing miraculous weight loss.

Yet, the benefits of intermittent fasting are not as strong as traditional daily calorie restriction.

The current research shows that people who followed a traditional diet lost more weight than those who were fasting, despite both eating the same number of calories.

For this study, participants were divided into three groups:

• Non-fasting dieting group: received 25 percent less calories across all meals every day.
• Fasting group: alternating 24-hour periods of complete fasting and eating 50 percent more than usual on non-fasting day.
• Fasting on alternate days: fasting one day then consuming 100 percent more than usual daily intake.

Prior to the study, all the participants had a typical diet of 2000-2500 calories every day.

During the study period, the average daily energy intake was reduced to 1500-2000 calories for the first and second groups.

The non-fasting group lost 1.9 kg in three weeks and body scans confirmed this amount of weight loss was completely from burring body fat and belly fat.

The second group lost 1.6 kg in three weeks but half this weight loss was from burning body fat and the other half was from losing muscle mass.

The third group, however, didn’t lose any weight.

Professor James Betts, the study’s lead author, said:

“Many people believe that diets based on fasting are especially effective for weight loss or that these diets have particular metabolic health benefits even if you don’t lose weight.

But intermittent fasting is no magic bullet and the findings of our experiment suggest that there is nothing special about fasting when compared with more traditional, standard diets people might follow.

Most significantly, if you are following a fasting diet it is worth thinking about whether prolonged fasting periods is actually making it harder to maintain muscle mass and physical activity levels, which are known to be very important factors for long-term health.”

The study was published in the journal Science Translational Medicine (Templeman et al., 2021).

An effective drug treatment for weight loss if you can tolerate the side-effects.

A combination of phentermine and topiramate extended release treatment could help overweight or obese adults to lose at least 5 percent of their weight.

The extended-release phentermine plus topiramate is an FDA approved drug for treating obesity.

Past studies have been shown that 7.5 mg phentermine and 46 mg topiramate daily dosage over one year led to a minimum of 5 percent weight loss.

A study found that when the phentermine and topiramate dosage increased, the weight loss was 10 percent or greater in obese and overweight patients.

Topiramate is an approved anti-convulsant drug which is used for treating seizures and preventing migraine.

Phentermine is an appetite suppressant medication used for treating obesity in conjunction with diet and exercise.

A 12-week trial by Guerdjikova et al., 2018, suggests that the combination of phentermine and topiramate extended-release (brand name Qsymia) together with a low-calorie diet and higher physical activity would effectively lower weight and body mass index (BMI).

They found that the combined phentermine–topiramate medication reduces binge-eating symptoms in patients with binge-eating disorder.

Dr Caroline Kramer and colleagues found that a 28-week daily dosage of 96 to 200 milligrams topiramate on its own resulted in 10 percent or greater weight loss.

The review investigated 10 trials on 3,300 overweight or obese patients who took topiramate over four months and lost 11.8 pounds (5.4 kg) compared with those who took “dummy” pills known as placebo.

Dr Kramer, the study’s lead author, said:

“Topiramate is not an approved drug for the treatment of obesity.

Data from individual clinical trials might not be sufficient to support physicians’ decision to prescribe it for this use, and robust evidence of its safety is lacking.”

The weight loss benefits appear to increase the higher the dosage and the longer the treatment.

However, higher doses of phentermine medication alone or with topiramate would make patients experience serious side-effects such as depression, anxiety and insomnia.

Dr Kramer said:

“Topiramate has a substantial effect on weight loss, at least comparable to the weight loss that other anti-obesity drugs induce.

We have so few pharmacological options for the treatment of obesity that I believe topiramate can be a useful tool together with diet and exercise.”

However, she emphasised that patients need to be aware of the possible side-effects.

The adverse effects include paraesthesia, a burning sensation of the skin, cognitive impairment like slower thinking, low concentration, memory loss, and movement disorders.

The studies were published in the journal Obesity Reviews (Kramer et al., 2011) and The Lancet Journal (Gadde et al., 2011). 

This major barrier to weight loss is easy to change.

A major barrier to weight loss is that dieters plan to eat foods they do not enjoy, like brussels sprouts.

Not only that, but they typically cut out all the foods they do enjoy, such as strawberries.

Naturally, this is a recipe for dieting failure because a lack of pleasure reduces motivation.

Instead, dieters should choose tasty and healthy foods that they enjoy eating.

An unhealthy treat from time-to-time probably does little harm.

The conclusions come from a study including 542 people whose dieting strategies were tested.

Dr Meredith David, the study’s first author, said:

“Our research shows that instead of creating rules to avoid one’s favorite treats, dieters should focus on eating healthy foods that they enjoy.

Dieters who restrict themselves from consuming the foods they love most may be setting themselves up for failure.

Instead, they may be better off by allowing occasional ‘treats’ and focusing attention on healthy foods that they enjoy and making it a point to include those tasty, but healthy foods in their diet.”

Dieting is particularly hard for people with low self-control.

Unfortunately, this type of people tend to restrict themselves from eating their favourite foods, when it might be better to allow an occasional treat.

People with low self-control are also more likely to choose healthy foods that they do not like eating, the study found.

Dr David said:

“In coming up with plans to enhance one’s health and well-being, low self-control individuals tend to set themselves up for a harder pathway to success by focusing on avoiding the very foods they find most tempting.

Our data reveals that individuals who are generally more successful at reaching their goals tend to develop more motivating plans regarding the inclusion of healthy, well-liked items and the exclusion of unhealthy items that are not one’s favorites.”

Dr David said pleasure is important:

“Frequent attention is given to health advice surrounding well-intentioned lists of ‘magical’ foods that everyone should eat or practically ‘poisonous’ foods that people should avoid consuming.

The next time you decide to go on a diet or seek to improve your health by altering your food consumption, opt for strategies that focus on including healthy foods in your diet, and focus specifically on those healthy foods that you really enjoy eating.”

The study was published in the journal Psychology & Marketing (David & Haws, 2016).

The diet means you can eat whatever you like…

A simple fasting technique called the 16:8 diet is an effective way to lose weight, research finds.

It involves eating whatever you like between the hours of 10am and 6pm.

Outside these hours, only water and other calorie-free drinks are allowed.

The name comes from the fact that it involves fasting for 16 hours (from 6pm to 10am the next morning) and feasting for 8 hours.

The advantage of this diet is that it is extremely simple to follow, says Dr Krista Varady, study co-author:

“The take-home message from this study is that there are options for weight loss that do not include calorie counting or eliminating certain foods.”

The study involved 23 obese people who followed the diet for 12 weeks.

On average, they lost around 3% of their body weight and their blood pressure also reduced significantly (compared with a control group).

The results are similar to those seen in other studies of intermittent fasting, Dr Varady said:

“The results we saw in this study are similar to the results we’ve seen in other studies on alternate day fasting, another type of diet, but one of the benefits of the 16:8 diet may be that it is easier for people to maintain.

We observed that fewer participants dropped out of this study when compared to studies on other fasting diets.”

The study’s authors write:

“These preliminary data offer promise for the use of time-restricted feeding as a weight loss technique in obese adults, but longer-term, large-scale randomized controlled trials [are required].

The 16:8 diet is another tool for weight loss that we now have preliminary scientific evidence to support.

When it comes to weight loss, people need to find what works for them because even small amounts of success can lead to improvements in metabolic health.”

The study was published in the journal Nutrition and Healthy Aging (Gabel et al., 2018).