By John Salak –
Weight loss is both difficult and for many all-consuming. By some estimates, 25 percent of all men and almost 50 percent of all women are on a diet on any given day. Unfortunately, it is also estimated that 95 percent of all diets fail at sustained weight loss.
Research, in fact, from the University of California, Los Angeles reports that more than 80 percent of dieters will regain all lost weight within five years of starting any diet. This isn’t only a bummer for those looking to trim down and look and feel better. The inability to shed pounds is a major health concern as more than 40 percent of American adults are thought to be obese, including almost 10 percent who are severely obese.
The health consequences are severe as obesity increases the risk of high blood pressure, heart disease, diabetes and cancer, according to the World Health Organization. The University of Illinois, however, may have discovered a way to help battle this dangerous battle of the bulge. A diet rich in protein and high in fiber has helped participants in in 25-month study lose significant amounts of weight.
The program’s initial success wasn’t just built around what participants consumed. The study found that the greatest success in this self-directed dietary education program was achieved by those who were able to personalize their approach to dieting, which included embracing enough flexibility to allow them to adhere to their unique plans over time.
After one year, successful dieters—or 41 percent of participants—had lost almost 13 percent of their body weight, compared with the remainder of the study sample, who lost slightly more than 2 percent of their starting weight.
The Illinois team noted that those achieving the greatest weight loss used data visualization tools and intensive dietary education sessions to increase their knowledge of key nutrients, enabling them to create personalized, safe and effective weight-loss plans.
“Flexibility and personalization are key in creating programs that optimize dieters’ success at losing weight and keeping it off,” said research leader Manabu T. Nakamura, a professor of nutrition at the university. “Sustainable dietary change, which varies from person to person, must be achieved to maintain a healthy weight. The iDip (Individualized Diet Improvement Program) approach allows participants to experiment with various dietary iterations, and the knowledge and skills they develop while losing weight serve as the foundation for sustainable maintenance.”
The key components of the program include increasing protein and fiber consumption along with consuming 1,500 calories or less daily. iDip team aided participants in weight-loss aims by creating a one-of-a-kind, two-dimensional quantitative data visualization tool that plots foods’ protein and fiber densities per calorie and provides a target range for each meal. Starting with foods they habitually ate, the dieters then created an individualized plan, increasing their protein intake to about 80 grams and their fiber intake to about 20 grams daily.
“The research strongly suggests that increasing protein and fiber intake while simultaneously reducing calories is required to optimize the safety and efficacy of weight loss diets,” reported first author Mindy H. Lee.
The preservation of lean mass is also important during losing weight, especially when using weight-loss drugs, the researchers added, noting the importance of protein.
“Recently, the popularity of injectable weight loss medications has been increasing,” Nakamura said. “However, using these medications when food intake is strongly limited will cause serious side effects of muscle and bone loss unless protein intake is increased during weight loss.”
The teams also noted that in tracking dieters’ protein and fiber intake, the team found a strong correlation between protein and fiber consumption and weight loss at three months and 12 months.
“The strong correlation suggests that participants who were able to develop sustainable dietary changes within the first three months kept losing weight in the subsequent months, whereas those who had difficulty implementing sustainable dietary patterns early on rarely succeeded in changing their diet in the later months,” Nakamura said.
