Links to studies supporting Low Carb/showing calorie restriction ineffective?

pdmjoker · Jul 20, 2019

Hello Folks,

I recently found this item from 2014 entitled "Study: Doubling Saturated Fat in the Diet Does Not Increase Saturated Fat in Blood":

https://news.osu.edu/news/2014/11/2...iet-does-not-increase-saturated-fat-in-blood/

which discusses the research paper "Effects of Step-Wise Increases in Dietary Carbohydrate on Circulating Saturated Fatty Acids and Palmitoleic Acid in Adults with Metabolic Syndrome" found here:

https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0113605

(co-authors Stephen D. Phinney and Jeff S. Volek will be familiar to many of you...)

I have heard of a study named something like Well Woman(?), a large-scale official US study which showed calorie restriction was not successful long-term, but can't find it.

I've heard of the Biggest Loser Study: https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1002/oby.21538 but there must be many more...

Please could people share links to good quality studies either supporting Low Carb or showing calorie restriction to be ineffective long-term? Many thanks!

pdmjoker · Jul 20, 2019

I found the study I mentioned above but couldn't track down: The Women’s Health Initiative study.

Jason Fung mentions it here: https://www.dietdoctor.com/caloric-restriction-cause-weight-loss-not-according-science
in a piece entitled "Does caloric restriction cause weight loss? Not according to science!"

copilost · Jul 21, 2019

pdmjoker said:
I found the study I mentioned above but couldn't track down: The Women’s Health Initiative study.

Jason Fung mentions it here: https://www.dietdoctor.com/caloric-restriction-cause-weight-loss-not-according-science
in a piece entitled "Does caloric restriction cause weight loss? Not according to science!"

is this it?
https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/fullarticle/202138

Mr_Pot · Jul 21, 2019

pdmjoker said:
I found the study I mentioned above but couldn't track down: The Women’s Health Initiative study.

Jason Fung mentions it here: https://www.dietdoctor.com/caloric-restriction-cause-weight-loss-not-according-science
in a piece entitled "Does caloric restriction cause weight loss? Not according to science!"

The Women's Health Initiative study did not involve calorie restriction. Jason Fung mentions this in the article, seemingly negating his own example.

pdmjoker · Jul 21, 2019

copilost said:
is this it?
https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/fullarticle/202138

Thank you. Women's Health Initiative was the name I couldn't recall.

pdmjoker · Jul 21, 2019

Mr_Pot said:
The Women's Health Initiative study did not involve calorie restriction. Jason Fung mentions this in the article, seemingly negating his own example.

Jason has written a fuller account of it here:
https://idmprogram.com/the-cruel-hoax-of-the-low-fat-diet-calories-part-ix/
It looks like, since dietary fat was reduced and replaced with (whole grain) carbs that a calorie reduction (361.4 daily) did indeed occur. It therefore can be classed as an example of calorie restriction.

Mr_Pot · Jul 21, 2019

pdmjoker said:
Jason has written a fuller account of it here:
https://idmprogram.com/the-cruel-hoax-of-the-low-fat-diet-calories-part-ix/
It looks like, since dietary fat was reduced and replaced with (whole grain) carbs that a calorie reduction (361.4 daily) did indeed occur. It therefore can be classed as an example of calorie restriction.

This was the bit that I noticed in the report you referenced in post #5
Participants were informed that the diet was not intended to promote weight loss and were encouraged to maintain usual energy intake by replacing fat calories with calories from other sources, mainly carbohydrate.
ETA I understand now, the trial was not supposed to reduce calories but it did anyway.

pdmjoker · Jul 22, 2019

Mr_Pot said:
... the trial was not supposed to reduce calories but it did anyway.

That's as I understand what happened...

pdmjoker · Jul 23, 2019

Answering my own question, I came across this page today entitled

"Studies Proving The Safety and Efficacy of the Low Carb Diet"

Link: https://www.bloodsugar101.com/studies-proving-low-carb-works

ATZ · Jul 24, 2019

This study proves it's energy intake and not carbohydrate you need to be concerned with:

https://academic.oup.com/ajcn/article/104/2/324/4564649

They compared a keto diet with a non keto diet, matched in calorie and protein intake, in a metabolic ward.

No difference in fat loss.

You need to widen your sources past those that confirm your bias.

Dark Horse · Jul 24, 2019

pdmjoker said:
Please could people share links to good quality studies either supporting Low Carb or showing calorie restriction to be ineffective long-term?

I'm not sure why you are looking for only these studies. It's important to review all the evidence both for and against a hypothesis in order to be able to weigh up the evidence fairly. To search only for evidence that supports your hypothesis would be deemed to be 'cherry-picking'. To reduce the chance of bias, it would be better to perform a systematic review.

You might like to have a look at these articles:-
https://eppi.ioe.ac.uk/cms/Default.aspx?tabid=69
http://www.bandolier.org.uk/painres/download/whatis/Syst-review.pdf

Mbaker · Jul 24, 2019

I dislike studies. They claim to be scientific. The facts of many of these we know to be frankly bin material. David Katz stated loads in a debate with Nina Teicholz recently; to the unitiated this was impressive and he did get the "win".....but did he. Not in my view due to the reliance on epidemiology.

Within the next month I am bound to read I have one foot in the grave by an established university study. I think the scientific method has been hijacked, and the new king is Engineering methodology.

I believe anecdotes, backed by medical records are hard to argue against, such as the Type 1 Grit results. I have time for Vollek and Phinney's Faster study as they properly fat adapted participants and showed fat burning changes conclusively.

Virta health's 2 year results are perhaps one of my favourites, as they didn't randomise in the traditional sense, they were not entirely prescriptive I.e. you must eat this much veg, meat, fruit etc - there's was a more realistic real world scenario. The only real control was ketone measuring.

I like results, with measures, over time.

ATZ · Jul 24, 2019

Mbaker said:
I dislike studies. They claim to be scientific. The facts of many of these we know to be frankly bin material. David Katz stated loads in a debate with Nina Teicholz recently; to the unitiated this was impressive and he did get the "win".....but did he. Not in my view due to the reliance on epidemiology.

Within the next month I am bound to read I have one foot in the grave by an established university study. I think the scientific method has been hijacked, and the new king is Engineering methodology.

I believe anecdotes, backed by medical records are hard to argue against, such as the Type 1 Grit results. I have time for Vollek and Phinney's Faster study as they properly fat adapted participants and showed fat burning changes conclusively.

Virta health's 2 year results are perhaps one of my favourites, as they didn't randomise in the traditional sense, they were not entirely prescriptive I.e. you must eat this much veg, meat, fruit etc - there's was a more realistic real world scenario. The only real control was ketone measuring.

I like results, with measures, over time.

This is the very antithesis of the scientific method.

Science isn't broken, people's interpretation of it is.

HSSS · Jul 24, 2019

ATZ said:
This study proves it's energy intake and not carbohydrate you need to be concerned with:

https://academic.oup.com/ajcn/article/104/2/324/4564649

They compared a keto diet with a non keto diet, matched in calorie and protein intake, in a metabolic ward.

No difference in fat loss.

You need to widen your sources past those that confirm your bias.

Without wishing to restart the same discussion ad nauseous didn’t we have the discussion on a previous thread that metabolically healthy people such as in this, any many other nutritional studies, do not respond the same as metabolically challenged people such as diabetics to carbohydrates so results cannot be inferred across the two groups.

And didn’t you admit you know nothing at all about diabetes and the problems carbohydrates cause us? https://www.diabetes.co.uk/forum/th...-restriction-fans.166300/page-17#post-2096877 Post #322.

Perhaps in the context of a diabetes forum this knowledge would be useful before arguing your points. You may find the knowledge fails to support your bias, or maybe gives you a more comprehensive background to argue your case at least.

copilost · Jul 24, 2019

ATZ said:
You need to widen your sources past those that confirm your bias.

and you? The wild west of the internet does throw up some dubious claims, but people aren't altogether stupid. The invested authorities are not above a little influencing (perhaps with good intentions but not necessarily with good scientific backing). Would it be so bad if some people responded better to a LCHF diet? It's plausible, though not yet proven, so much in life is uncertain, we think we "know" stuff and then we don't, that's OK.

ATZ · Jul 24, 2019

HSSS said:
Without wishing to restart the same discussion ad nauseous didn’t we have the discussion on a previous thread that metabolically healthy people such as in this, any many other nutritional studies, do not respond the same as metabolically challenged people such as diabetics to carbohydrates so results cannot be inferred across the two groups.

And didn’t you admit you know nothing at all about diabetes and the problems carbohydrates cause us? https://www.diabetes.co.uk/forum/th...-restriction-fans.166300/page-17#post-2096877 Post #322.

Perhaps in the context of a diabetes forum this knowledge would be useful before arguing your points. You may find the knowledge fails to support your bias, or maybe gives you a more comprehensive background to argue your case at least.

@HSSS my response in that previous thread was sarcastic (and heavily edited by mods).

The claim that diabetics (type 1 or 2) are somehow metabolically unique and don't coform to thermodynamics doesn't stack up.

I mean this is from Diabetes UK

"A low GI diet can help you manage your blood sugar levels, but the evidence for people with diabetes losing weight is not very strong."

https://www.diabetes.org.uk/guide-t...iabetes/whats-your-healthy-weight/lose-weight

pdmjoker · Jul 24, 2019

ATZ said:
This study proves it's energy intake and not carbohydrate you need to be concerned with:

https://academic.oup.com/ajcn/article/104/2/324/4564649

They compared a keto diet with a non keto diet, matched in calorie and protein intake, in a metabolic ward.

No difference in fat loss.

You need to widen your sources past those that confirm your bias.

That study did just 4 weeks with each diet. (It takes 3 weeks to become Keto adapted anyway!) The trouble with many metabolic ward studies is that they are too short to enable extrapolation to 1 or 2 years, say, and to therefore take into account the inevitable metabolic slowdown. Also, I asked for "links to good quality studies either supporting Low Carb or showing calorie restriction to be ineffective long-term?" Do you call 4 weeks long-term? I don't...

ATZ · Jul 24, 2019

copilost said:
and you? The wild west of the internet does throw up some dubious claims, but people aren't altogether stupid. The invested authorities are not above a little influencing (perhaps with good intentions but not necessarily with good scientific backing). Would it be so bad if some people responded better to a LCHF diet? It's plausible, though not yet proven, so much in life is uncertain, we think we "know" stuff and then we don't, that's OK.

The Hall study was funded by NuSi. An organisation set up by low carb fanatic Gary Taubes to prove his "carbohydrate and insulin cause obesity" hypothesis.

When Hall's well controlled studies proved that to be false he accused him of bias.

It's Dunning-Kruger effect in full flow.

copilost · Jul 24, 2019

ATZ said:
my response in that previous thread was sarcastic

well don't be, this isn't, i presume, happening to you (diabetes), so take your size 10 boots and park them, just a suggestion.

ATZ · Jul 24, 2019

pdmjoker said:
That study did just 4 weeks with each diet. (It takes 3 weeks to become Keto adapted anyway!) The trouble with many metabolic ward studies is that they are too short to enable extrapolation to 1 or 2 years, say, and to therefore take into account the inevitable metabolic slowdown. Also, I asked for "links to good quality studies either supporting Low Carb or showing calorie restriction to be ineffective long-term?" Do you call 4 weeks long-term? I don't...

Metabolic ward studies are the gold standard because they control all variables. Unfortunately they are costly and it would be unethical to do them long term (you have to keep people couped up).

That's why you don't find long term studies of this nature.

However long term studies are generally plagued by inaccuracies, such as self reported dietary intake, poor compliance and other issues.

Also it does not take 3 weeks to become keto adapted. This study: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24351673/ shows it can take as little as 48hrs.

Links to studies supporting Low Carb/showing calorie restriction ineffective?

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