Do you track your calories if you are trying to lose weight? Do you look at the amount of fat that is present in food? Protein and carbohydrates? For most people the answer to most of these questions is “sometimes”. When you might ask why they don’t pay closer attention to some of these attributes of food, they may mention that a single factor is more important than others. What is the main factor in weight loss when it comes to the composition of food?
Public Domain Author: Peggy Greb, U.S. Department of Agriculture
There are many advocates for the plant-based low-fat high-carbohydrate way of eating. This approach generally will contain around ~65% energy from carbohydrates, ~15% energy from protein and ~20% energy from fats. This diet calls for a large number of whole foods such as whole grains, fruits, and vegetables. The benefits are generally to have improved cardiovascular markers such as lowered cholesterol levels, lowered triglycerides, reduced C-reactive protein levels (inflammation biomarker) and have higher energy levels. A study took a look at a standard non-calorically restricted low-fat plant-based diet that was followed for 16 weeks. They found that with increasing percentage of energy from carbohydrates and increased consumption of total and insoluble fiber was associated with a lower weight. It also had favorable effects on insulin control which means it can be effective in reversing pre-diabetes.
Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International license. Author: Øyvind Holmstad
Another popular diet regimen for weight loss is a low-carbohydrate diet, popular variants include the Ketogenic diet (~5% energy from carbohydrates, ~20% energy from protein, and ~75% calories from fat) or the Atkins diet (a higher protein and lower fat variant of the Ketogenic diet). These diets aim at carbohydrate restriction to induce a state of mainly burning fat for your body’s energy needs. This is a state of ketosis and this can reduce appetite which can make dieting easier. This diet also claims to improve the same cardiovascular markers as previously mentioned in the low-fat diet description. A study shows that when pinned side by side, low carbohydrate diets can lead to more favorable changes in lipid profiles, as well as being greater in effectiveness for weight loss even while calories weren’t restricted when compared side-by-side with a calorically restricted low-fat diet.
Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license. Author: M21Cestda
The idea of a diet is frightening to many because the restriction is not easy especially from food. A diet should aim to increase your cardiovascular biomarkers to minimize risk for disease and increase your chances of leading a long healthy life. In dietary studies, many studies contradict results of another, A study which reviewed all the other smaller scale studies on the different macronutrient composition diets found that there was no significant difference between weight loss in different diets assuming that calories were controlled. This means that the diet that would be the ideal candidate for inducing weight loss would be a calorie restricted plan which can be followed the best.
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