How To Lose Weight With Keto Diet
All You Need To Know For Shedding Pounds
What is Keto Diet?
The ketogenic, or ‘keto diet’ for short, is a low carb ‘body hack’ diet that claims to trigger an alternative metabolic state in the body, leading to weight loss. Ketosis is a state your body enters when it isn’t getting enough carbohydrates from dietary sources and switches to burning the body’s fat reserves. This creates something called ketones, which can be used as energy. If someone’s blood ketone levels reach more than 0.5 millimoles per liter then they are in a state of ketosis.
HOW DOES THE KETO DIET WORK?
By replacing carbohydrates with fat sources the body goes through a physiological change and enters a state called ketosis. When in ketosis, the body begins metabolizing its stores of fat and producing ketones, which it uses as energy instead of its usual preferred source - carbohydrates.
As the keto diet removes most dietary carbohydrates, including simple sugars, people on the keto diet may be less likely to have ‘sugar crashes’ as their carbohydrate intake is very low. A review in the journal Neuroscience & Biobehavioral Reviews indicates that the effect of sugar on mood can be detrimental and cause feelings of fatigue, sometimes as soon as 30 minutes after consuming carbohydrates.
BENEFITS OF THE KETO DIET
One review in the International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health indicated that the keto diet could be beneficial in the treatment of obesity when implemented under the supervision of a doctor. The benefits included reduction in hunger in obese adults and potential to improve fat oxidative metabolism, which could reduce overall weight. The review also summarizes that the diet can be useful from a period of a few weeks (to induce a state of ketosis) to several months, but advises caution when reintroducing carbohydrates into subjects' diets.
Clark agrees that the keto diet can be a useful weight loss tool. “Keto diets are associated with quicker initial weight losses, mainly due to the loss of water as carbohydrate stores in the body are used up,” she says. “Some people find the satiation achieved with higher protein and fat intakes useful as a weight management tool. However, 12 months down the line, weight loss results between low carb and low fat approaches are similar.”
