Weight Loss, Health, & Fitness Programs - Can Science Help You Choose the Best One?

Perhaps you have friends who have lost weight using one of the major diet programs. Or maybe they swear by something else, and judging from the results you can see with your own eyes, it certainly seems to be working. Should you give one of these a try based upon your limited observations, or is there a more scientific approach to choosing the best program for you?

A group of researchers at Yale University had the same question. They studied scientific papers on dieting going back to 1966. Their conclusion? There was no evidence that low carbohydrate diets were more effective than any other diet. In fact, the only real winner they found was reduced calorie-consumption over prolonged periods of time - what some dieters might call "old school."

Another gem the Yale project uncovered was how very little basic research has been done in this field. Out of the more than 2,600 articles they examined, only 94 met their minimum criteria for scientific acceptability, namely use of proper controls and duration of at least four days. Little information was available about the effects of diets on ethnic groups or subjects over age 60. Exercise information was also scarce.

Apart from the Yale team, other research agencies have only recently indicated an interest in conducting weight-loss studies. Unless the research is somehow tied to illnesses, such as diabetes or heart disease, pharmaceutical companies won't provide funding and other grants are hard to come by.

Then, when research is conducted, it sometimes produces unsettling results. In 2007, a group at UCLA reported that all the diets they studied were capable of helping subjects lose up to 5-10 percent of their total weight, "but then the weight comes back." The report went on: "Sustained weight loss was found only in a small minority of participants, while complete weight regain was found in the majority. Diets do not lead to sustained weight loss or health benefits for the majority of people."

Ouch! Does that mean we are doomed to failure no matter what health and fitness path we choose? Not so, says a nutritionist in Denmark who has studied obesity. "Thinking that a specific diet should eliminate people's weight problems is totally unrealistic," she says. "The laws of thermodynamics provide the answer. To lose weight, your energy intake cannot exceed your energy output. You will get fat no matter what proportions of fat, carbohydrate and protein are in your diet, unless you burn more than you put in." Now doesn't that sound like a good argument for "old school," combining sensible eating with regular exercise?

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