Category Archives: Diet And Food

Can change in diet stop the growth of cancer cells? Here's what study has to say  Hindustan Times

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Can change in diet stop the growth of cancer cells? Here's what study has to say - Hindustan Times

Anti-pollution diet: 5 must-haves in your daily diet to guard your lungs  Times of India

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Anti-pollution diet: 5 must-haves in your daily diet to guard your lungs - Times of India

Overview

Vitamin B-12 (cobalamin) plays an essential role in red blood cell formation, cell metabolism, nerve function and the production of DNA, the molecules inside cells that carry genetic information.

Food sources of vitamin B-12 include poultry, meat, fish and dairy products. Vitamin B-12 is also added to some foods, such as fortified breakfast cereals, and is available as an oral supplement. Vitamin B-12 injections or nasal spray might be prescribed to treat vitamin B-12 deficiency.

Vitamin B-12 deficiency is not common in the U.S. However, people who follow a vegetarian or vegan diet might be prone to deficiency because plant foods don't contain vitamin B-12. Older adults and people with digestive tract conditions that affect absorption of nutrients also are susceptible to vitamin B-12 deficiency.

Left untreated, a vitamin B-12 deficiency can lead to anemia, fatigue, muscle weakness, intestinal problems, nerve damage and mood disturbances.

The recommended daily amount of vitamin B-12 for adults is 2.4 micrograms.

Research on the use of vitamin B-12 for specific activities and conditions shows:

Most people get enough vitamin B-12 from a balanced diet. However, older adults, vegetarians, vegans and people who have conditions that affect their ability to absorb vitamin B-12 from foods might benefit from the use of oral supplements.

Vitamin B-12 supplements also are recommended for women who are pregnant or breastfeeding exclusively and follow vegetarian or vegan diets.

When taken at appropriate doses, vitamin B-12 supplements are generally considered safe. While the recommended daily amount of vitamin B-12 for adults is 2.4 micrograms, higher doses have been found to be safe. Your body absorbs only as much as it needs, and any excess passes through your urine.

High doses of vitamin B-12, such as those used to treat a deficiency, might cause:

Possible interactions include:

Your doctor might recommend changing drugs or timing doses to offset any potential interactions.

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Vitamin B-12 - Mayo Clinic

Methods of weight loss that scientific research supports include the following:

Intermittent fasting (IF) is a pattern of eating that involves regular short-term fasts and consuming meals within a shorter time period during the day.

Several studies have indicated that short-term intermittent fasting, which is up to 24 weeks in duration, leads to weight loss in overweight individuals.

The most common intermittent fasting methods include the following:

It is best to adopt a healthy eating pattern on non-fasting days and to avoid over-eating.

If someone wants to lose weight, they should be aware of everything that they eat and drink each day. The most effective way to do this is to log every item that they consume, in either a journal or an online food tracker.

Researchers estimated in 2017 that there would be 3.7 billion health app downloads by the end of the year. Of these, apps for diet, physical activity, and weight loss were among the most popular. This is not without reason, as tracking physical activity and weight loss progress on-the-go can be an effective way of managing weight.

One study found that consistent tracking of physical activity helped with weight loss. Meanwhile, a review study found a positive correlation between weight loss and the frequency of monitoring food intake and exercise. Even a device as simple as a pedometer can be a useful weight-loss tool.

Mindful eating is a practice where people pay attention to how and where they eat food. This practice can enable people to enjoy the food they eat and maintain a healthy weight.

As most people lead busy lives, they often tend to eat quickly on the run, in the car, working at their desks, and watching TV. As a result, many people are barely aware of the food they are eating.

Techniques for mindful eating include:

Protein can regulate appetite hormones to help people feel full. This is mostly due to a decrease in the hunger hormone ghrelin and a rise in the satiety hormones peptide YY, GLP-1, and cholecystokinin.

Research on young adults has also demonstrated that the hormonal effects of eating a high-protein breakfast can last for several hours.

Good choices for a high-protein breakfast include eggs, oats, nut and seed butters, quinoa porridge, sardines, and chia seed pudding.

The Western diet is increasingly high in added sugars, and this has definite links to obesity, even when the sugar occurs in beverages rather than food.

Refined carbohydrates are heavily processed foods that no longer contain fiber and other nutrients. These include white rice, bread, and pasta.

These foods are quick to digest, and they convert to glucose rapidly.

Excess glucose enters the blood and provokes the hormone insulin, which promotes fat storage in the adipose tissue. This contributes to weight gain.

Where possible, people should swap processed and sugary foods for more healthful options. Good food swaps include:

Dietary fiber describes plant-based carbohydrates that it is not possible to digest in the small intestine, unlike sugar and starch. Including plenty of fiber in the diet can increase the feeling of fullness, potentially leading to weight loss.

Fiber-rich foods include:

One emerging area of research is focusing on the role of bacteria in the gut on weight management.

The human gut hosts a vast number and variety of microorganisms, including around 37 trillion bacteria.

Every individual has different varieties and amounts of bacteria in their gut. Some types can increase the amount of energy that the person harvests from food, leading to fat deposition and weight gain.

Some foods can increase the number of good bacteria in the gut, including:

Numerous studies have shown that getting less than 56 hours of sleep per night is associated with increased incidence of obesity. There are several reasons behind this.

Research suggests that insufficient or poor-quality sleep slows down the process in which the body converts calories to energy, called metabolism. When metabolism is less effective, the body may store unused energy as fat. In addition, poor sleep can increase the production of insulin and cortisol, which also prompt fat storage.

How long someone sleeps also affects the regulation of the appetite-controlling hormones leptin and ghrelin. Leptin sends signals of fullness to the brain.

Stress triggers the release of hormones such as adrenaline and cortisol, which initially decrease the appetite as part of the bodys fight or flight response.

However, when people are under constant stress, cortisol can remain in the bloodstream for longer, which will increase their appetite and potentially lead to them eating more.

Cortisol signals the need to replenish the bodys nutritional stores from the preferred source of fuel, which is carbohydrate.

Insulin then transports the sugar from carbohydrates from the blood to the muscles and brain. If the individual does not use this sugar in fight or flight, the body will store it as fat.

Researchers found that implementing an 8-week stress-management intervention program resulted in significant reduction in the body mass index (BMI) of children and adolescents who are overweight or have obesity.

Some methods of managing stress include:

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How to lose weight fast: 9 scientific ways to drop fat - Medical News Today

A Cornell University nutritional biochemist to lecture on the link between diet and disease  The Villages Daily Sun

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A Cornell University nutritional biochemist to lecture on the link between diet and disease - The Villages Daily Sun

At any given time, more than a third of Americans are on a specific diet, with weight loss as a leading reason. Most are going to be disappointed, because even when successful, lost weight is frequently regained within a few months.

While most weight-loss diets can help you lose weight, they may be unsuccessful over the long run for a number of reasons. Some people dont follow their diets carefully and dont lose much weight even from the start. Others may go off the diet entirely after a while, because its too restrictive or the foods arent appealing. Some may engage in less physical activity as they consume fewer calories. But who hasnt heard of someone doing everything right and still losing minimal weight, or regaining lost weight over time? Perhaps that someone is you.

Even when research studies confine study subjects to a research setting with carefully-controlled calories, food types, and physical activity, and with intensive counselling, teaching, and monitoring the lost weight and other health benefits (such as improved cholesterol and reduced blood pressure) tend to disappear soon after the study ends.

According to a new study, popular diets simply dont work for the vast majority of people. Or more accurately, they are modestly effective for a while, but after a year or so the benefits are largely gone.

In a large systematic review and meta-analysis, recently published in the medical journal The BMJ, researchers analyzed 121 trials that enrolled nearly 22,000 overweight or obese adults who followed one of 14 popular diets, including the Atkins diet, Weight Watchers, Jenny Craig, DASH, and the Mediterranean diet, for an average of six months. The diets were grouped into one of three categories: low-carbohydrate, low-fat, and moderate-macronutrient (diets in this group were similar to those in the low-fat group, but with slightly more fat and slightly less carbohydrate). Loss of excess weight and cardiovascular measures (including cholesterol and blood pressure) while on one of these diets were compared with other diets or usual diets (one in which the person continued to eat as they usually do).

While weight, blood pressure, and cholesterol measures generally improved at the six-month mark, results at the 12-month mark were disappointing, to say the least.

Based on this new report, you might be tempted to throw up your hands and give up on weight-loss diets altogether. But theres another way of looking at this: it probably matters less which plan you pick (whether low-carb, low-fat, or something in between) than whether you stick with it.

The average duration of the studies included in this analysis was six months. What if theyd lasted 12 months, or two years, or a lifetime? The benefit would likely have been greater and more long-lasting. The trick is to pick a diet with foods you actually like so that its not so hard to stick with it.

In addition, there are factors other than diet that can have a big impact on weight. For example, everyday physical activity, regular exercise, and sleep are important in helping to maintain a healthy weight.

Rather than following a highly restrictive or named diet, I endorse the Mediterranean diet. Its among the best studied, performs well when compared with other diets (as in this analysis), and was the only diet in this analysis to have long-lasting effects on LDL cholesterol levels.

Losing weight is not easy. If youre struggling with your weight, talk to your doctor, a nutritionist, and perhaps a health coach. Review this study with them and, together, decide on dietary and other lifestyle changes that appeal to you. Then stick with them. Remember, youre most likely to stick with lifestyle changes you actually like.

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When dieting doesnt work - Harvard Health

Hi friends! Happy Thursday! I have a new podcast episode and cant wait to hear your thoughts on this one.

Today, Im chatting with Lisa Moskovitz, RD, all about quieting the diet noise and why diets dont work.

Heres what we talk about on todays episode:

How to quiet the diet noise: how become a more confident, autonomous, and intuitive eater, and improve your relationship with food

How to move the needle towards fitness and weight loss goals in a healthy way

Why diets dont work: how they actually bring you further away from finding your healthiest, happiest weight

How diets impact your metabolism

Her tips for being Healthy in Real Life

and so.much.more.

I LOVED todays conversation and hope that youll take a listen!

Heres a bit more about Lisa and her background:

Lisa Moskovitz, RD, is a registered dietitian, the CEO of NY Nutrition Group, a large group nutrition practice and the author of The Core 3 Healthy Eating Plan, a personalized, science-based guide to finding your healthiest, happiest weight. She received a BS in nutrition from Syracuse University and then went on to complete an intensive dietetic internship at NYPresbyterian Hospital. Since then, she has accumulated over a decade of experience in private practice, providing nutrition workshops and working with the media. Lisa is regularly featured in major publications such as Well + Good, Eat This Not That, Yahoo Health and is often interviewed for popular news channels such as Fox 5 NY, CBS News and Inside Edition.

Check out her website here, her Instagram here, and get a copy of The Core 3 Healthy Eating Plan (use Core20 for 20% off!).

Resources from this episode:

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Get 15% offOrganifiwith the code FITNESSISTA. I drink the green juice, red juice, gold, and Harmony! (Each day I might have something different, or have two different things. Everything Ive tried is amazing.)

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If any of my fellow health professional friends are looking for another way to help their clients, I highly recommend IHP. You can also use this information to heal yourself and then go one to heal others, which I think is a beautiful mission.

You can use my referral link hereand the code FITNESSISTA for up to $250 off the Integrative Health Practitioner program. I just finished Level 1 and have started Level 2. I highly recommend it!You can check out my initial thoughts on IHP here!

Thank you so much for listening and for all of your support with the podcast! Please be sure to subscribe, and leave a rating or review if you enjoyed this episode. If you leave a rating,head to this pageand youll get a little thank you gift from me to you.

xo

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111: Why diets dont work with Lisa Moskovitz, RD

Finding yourself confused by the seemingly endless promotion of weight-loss strategies and diet plans? In this series, we take a look at some popular dietsand review the research behind them.

Intermittent fasting is a diet regimen that cycles between brief periods of fasting, with either no food or significant calorie reduction, and periods of unrestricted eating. It is promoted to change body composition through loss of fat mass and weight, and to improve markers of health that are associated with disease such as blood pressure and cholesterol levels. Its roots derive from traditional fasting, a universal ritual used for health or spiritual benefit as described in early texts by Socrates, Plato, and religious groups. [1] Fasting typically entails a steady abstinence of food and beverages, ranging from 12 hours to one month. It may require complete abstinence, or allow a reduced amount of food and beverages.

Prolonged very low calorie diets can cause physiological changes that may cause the body to adapt to the calorie restriction and therefore prevent further weight loss. [2] Intermittent fasting attempts to address this problem by cycling between a low calorie level for a brief time followed by normal eating, which may prevent these adaptations. However, research does not consistently show that intermittent fasting is superior to continuous low calorie diets for weight loss efficiency.

The most common methods are fasting on alternate days, for whole days with a specific frequency per week, or during a set time frame. [3]

Physiologically, calorie restriction has been shown in animals to increase lifespan and improve tolerance to various metabolic stresses in the body. [4] Although the evidence for caloric restriction in animal studies is strong, there is less convincing evidence in human studies. Proponents of the diet believe that the stress of intermittent fasting causes an immune response that repairs cells and produces positive metabolic changes (reduction in triglycerides, LDL cholesterol, blood pressure, weight, fat mass, blood glucose). [3,5] An understandable concern of this diet is that followers will overeat on non-fasting days to compensate for calories lost during fasting. However, studies have not shown this to be true when compared with other weight loss methods. [5]

A systematic review of 40 studies found that intermittent fasting was effective for weight loss, with a typical loss of 7-11 pounds over 10 weeks. [2] There was much variability in the studies, ranging in size from 4 to 334 subjects, and followed from 2 to 104 weeks. It is important to note that different study designs and methods of intermittent fasting were used, and participant characteristics differed (lean vs. obese). Half of the studies were controlled trials comparing the fasting group to a comparison group and/or a control group (either continuous calorie restriction or usual lifestyle), with the other half examining an intermittent fasting group alone. A brief summary of their findings:

A randomized controlled trial that followed 100 obese individuals for one year did not find intermittent fasting to be more effective than daily calorie restriction. [6] For the 6-month weight loss phase, subjects were either placed on an alternating day fast (alternating days of one meal of 25% of baseline calories versus 125% of baseline calories divided over three meals) or daily calorie restriction (75% of baseline calories divided over three meals) following the American Heart Association guidelines. After 6 months, calorie levels were increased by 25% in both groups with a goal of weight maintenance. Participant characteristics of the groups were similar; mostly women and generally healthy. The trial examined weight changes, compliance rates, and cardiovascular risk factors. Their findings when comparing the two groups:

A one-year randomized trial also did not find intermittent fasting (16:8 method) more beneficial than calorie reduction without a restricted eating time. [7] Patients with obesity were placed on the same moderate calorie restriction but randomized to one of two groups: time-restricted eating (allowed to eat from 8am-4pm), or allowed to eat any time. Weight, waist circumference, body mass index, body fat, and blood work were measured. At one year, the time-restricted group lost an average of 18 pounds and the time-unrestricted group lost 14 pounds; blood pressure, cholesterol, and blood glucose levels also decreased. However, the changes in weight and other parameters were not significantly different among the groups.

This type of dietary pattern would be difficult for someone who eats every few hours (e.g., snacks between meals, grazes). It would also not be appropriate for those with conditions that require food at regular intervals due to metabolic changes caused by their medications, such as with diabetes. Prolonged periods of food deprivation or semi-starvation places one at risk for overeating when food is reintroduced, and may foster unhealthy behaviors such as an increased fixation on food. [8,9]

Individuals with the following conditions should abstain from intermittent fasting:

Unanswered Questions

Although certain benefits of caloric restriction have been demonstrated in animal studies, similar benefits of intermittent fasting in humans have not been observed. It is unclear that intermittent fasting is superior to other weight loss methods in regards to amount of weight loss, biological changes, compliance rates, and decreased appetite. Certain people who typically eat one or two meals a day or do not eat for long stretches of time may show better compliance with this type of regimen. Additionally, people who tend to eat or snack excessively at night may benefit from a cut-off eating time, especially if the late eating leads to unpleasant side effects such as reflux or disrupted sleep.

More high-quality studies including randomized controlled trials with follow-up of greater than one year are needed to show a direct effect and the possible benefits of intermittent fasting. Strong recommendations on intermittent fasting for weight loss cannot be made at this time.

The contents of this website are for educational purposes and are not intended to offer personal medical advice. You should seek the advice of your physician or other qualified health provider with any questions you may have regarding a medical condition. Never disregard professional medical advice or delay in seeking it because of something you have read on this website. The Nutrition Source does not recommend or endorse any products.

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Diet Review: Intermittent Fasting for Weight Loss

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For instance, we want you to know that its very important to adjust diabetes medications when starting a low-carb diet. In particular, insulin doses may need to be lowered to avoid low blood sugar, and SGLT-2 inhibitors may need to be discontinued (see below).

We want you to discuss any changes in medication and lifestyle with your doctor before making any such changes. Full disclaimer

So you have diabetes and want to try eating low carb or keto? Good for you! Making these dietary changes has the potential to reverse type 2 diabetes. Or, if you have type 1 diabetes, doing so could dramatically improve your blood sugar control.

However, you need to know what you are doing, and you need to communicate frequently with your healthcare team. Once you start eating low carb you will likely have to lower your insulin doses as well as the doses of other diabetes medications, frequently by quite a lot.

Avoiding the carbohydrates that raise your blood sugar decreases your need for medicationto lower it. Taking the same dose of insulin or insulin-stimulating oral medication as you did prior to adopting a low-carb diet might result in low blood sugar, something that can be dangerous.

You need to test your blood sugar frequently when starting this diet and adjust your medication accordingly. This should always be done with the assistance of a physician or other health professional with expertise in diabetes (find a low-carb doctor).

If you have diabetes and youre treated by diet alone, there is an extremely low risk of low blood sugar on low carb. You can get started right away.

As a general rule, you will need to lower your doses when starting a strict low-carb diet.

Work with your doctor to find the right initial reduction. Many find they need to reduce long acting insulin between 30 and 50%. If you take intermediate- or long-acting insulin once or twice daily, consider reducing both doses by the same proportion. If you are on a basal-bolus regimen (taking fast-acting insulin before meals, and long-acting insulin once or twice a day), you may want to reduce your mealtime doses more than your basal. This careful experimentation should be done in conjunction with your healthcare provider.

If you remain low carb, it is possible you will be able to stop mealtime insulin altogether. If your blood sugar levels continue to drop off the mealtime insulin, you can then begin to more aggressively reduce your long-acting insulin. As blood sugars stabilize in the normal range, you may be able to continue weaning the insulin, as long as glucose levels continue to be normal. Many people on a low carb diet are able to come off insulin completely.

Note that many physicians feel it is safer to decrease insulin doses by too much rather than not enough. This is because taking too much insulin can result in a low blood sugar level, which has the potential to be acutely dangerous. On the other hand, having slightly high blood sugars for short periods of time is usually not going to have major health consequences.

In addition, frequent low blood sugars lead to eating or drinking glucose or another form of rapid-acting carbohydrate in order to raise your glucose to a safe level. These extra calories may very well thwart your efforts at weight loss.

Much of the above advice about insulin also applies to people with type 1 diabetes, with the critical difference that people with type 1 will not be able to discontinue insulin entirely. Nonetheless, a low-carb, high-fat diet can be fantastic for empowering people with type 1 diabetes to smooth out their wide swings in blood sugar.

However, eating low carb with type 1 diabetes requires even greater attention to blood sugar levels and insulin adjustment, and an even closer working relationship with your healthcare team.

Many people with type 1 diabetes use an insulin to carbohydrate ratio (ICR) to calculate their mealtime insulin doses. If using an ICR while eating a low-carb diet, you may continue to give the same ratio of insulin to the carbohydrates you eat. But, as you eat fewer carbs, you will be injecting less insulin overall.

In some cases, the amount of insulin required for meals will not decrease as much as would be expected for the lower carb intake; this is presumably due to the potential of higher protein intakes to increase gluconeogenesis (the production of new sugar by the liver). In other cases, insulin doses will drop more than expected, as some people will lose weight on a low-carb diet, becoming more insulin sensitive in the process.

People who use relatively fixed mealtime doses of insulin, or those on premixed insulin twice daily, should use a similar approach to those with type 2 diabetes. Again, the critical difference is that people with type 1 diabetes will always need some insulin, even on a very low-carbohydrate diet.

It is important to be aware that a diet with less than 50 grams of carbs each day can lead to ketosis, a normal physiological state that results from the body burning fat for energy. This should not be confused with ketoacidosis, a dangerous complication of type 1 diabetes that can occur when there is insufficient insulin.

Because people with type 1 diabetes are at risk of progressing from physiologic ketosis to dangerous ketoacidosis, we recommend that they start with a more liberal low-carb diet, containing at least 50 grams of carbs per day. If you wish, you can eventually begin to reduce your carb intake to 30-40 grams of carbs per day, while working closely with your healthcare team and carefully monitoring your ketone levels.

We do not recommend starting a ketogenic low-carb diet (below 20 grams a day) unless youre certain of how to manage this risk and are working closely with a very experienced healthcare practitioner. You have to be able to test your ketones often, using extra care if you feel even slightly ill, practice intermittent fasting, or have been exercising.

Type 1 diabetes how to control your blood sugar with fewer carbs

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Starting Low Carb or Keto with Diabetes Medications - Diet Doctor

Does the brain need carbs?

Theres a long-standing yet misguided belief that carbs are necessary for proper brain function. In fact, if you ask some dietitians how many carbs you should eat, theyll likely respond that you need a minimum of 130 grams per day to ensure that your brain has a steady supply of glucose.

However, this isnt the case. In fact, your brain will remain healthy and functional even if you dont eat any carbs at all.

Although its true that your brain has high energy demands and requires some glucose, ketones can provide about 70% of the brains needed fuel. The liver provides the remainder of needed energy in the form of glucose, which is made by gluconeogenesis (literally making new glucose).

This system allowed our hunter-gatherer ancestors to go for long periods without eating because they had access to a fuel source at all times: stored body fat.

Being in ketosis doesnt have any adverse effects on brain function. On the contrary, many people have reported that that they feel sharper mentally when theyre in ketosis.

Food for thought: Does the brain need carbs?

In addition to providing a sustainable energy source, ketones and in particular BHB may help reduce inflammation and oxidative stress, which are believed to play a role in the development of many chronic diseases.

Indeed, there are several established benefits and potential benefits of being in nutritional ketosis.

Established benefits:

There is also exciting early research suggesting that ketosis may be beneficial for many other conditions, such as reducing the frequency and severity of migraine headaches, reversing PCOS, perhaps enhancing conventional brain cancer therapies, possibly slowing down the progression of Alzheimers disease, along with potentially helping people live longer, healthier lives. Although higher quality research is needed to confirm these effects, much of the early research is very encouraging.

Nutritional ketosis and diabetic ketoacidosis are entirely different conditions. While nutritional ketosis is safe and beneficial for health, ketoacidosis is a medical emergency.

Unfortunately, many healthcare professionals dont really understand the distinction between the two.

Ketoacidosis occurs mainly in people with type 1 diabetes if they arent getting enough insulin to meet their needs. In diabetic ketoacidosis (DKA), blood sugar and ketones rise to dangerous levels, which disrupts the bloods delicate acid-base balance.

In nutritional ketosis, BHB levels typically remain below 5 mmol/L. However, people in diabetic ketoacidosis often have BHB levels of 10 mmol/L or above, which is directly related to their inability to produce insulin.

This graph shows the vast difference in the amount of ketones in the blood between ketosis and ketoacidosis:

Other people who can potentially go into ketoacidosis are those with type 2 diabetes who take medications known as SGLT-2 inhibitors, such as empagliflozin, canagliflozin, dapagliflozin, and ertugliflozin.

Also, in rare cases, women who dont have diabetes can develop ketoacidosis while breastfeeding.

However, for most people capable of producing insulin, its nearly impossible to go into ketoacidosis.

There are a number of ways you can get into nutritional ketosis safely and effectively.

Even more tips for how to get into ketosis on a keto diet

Note whats not on the list above: you do not need expensive supplements, like exogenous ketones or MCT oil (medium-chain triglycerides). These supplements will likely not help you lose weight or reverse disease. At least theres no evidence for that.

Ketone supplements do not lower insulin or blood sugar and dont increase fat burning. Its hard to believe that they would have any direct benefits for weight loss or type 2 diabetes reversal.

What these ketone supplements might do is improve mental and physical performance for a short time. To the best of our knowledge, this potential is also unproven. They do raise blood levels of ketones, an effect that can last anywhere from one to a few hours.

Were not saying dont buy these supplements. Perhaps you want to try them for yourself, and see how they make you feel. But you dont need them to be successful on a keto diet or to get into ketosis. Heres our big test of keto supplements:

Exogenous ketone supplements: Do they work?

Although getting sufficient protein on any diet is important for preventing muscle loss, many questions have been raised about proteins impact on ketone levels.

During digestion, protein is broken down into individual amino acids, which triggers the release of insulin. Although the amount of insulin needed to transport these amino acids into muscles is small, when large amounts of protein are consumed, the rise in insulin might reduce ketone production to some extent.

For this reason, ketogenic diets for epilepsy are restricted in protein as well as carbs, which ensures that ketone levels remain elevated at all times.

However, proteins effect on ketosis seems to be highly individualized.

For example, when Diet Doctors Bjarte Bakke conducted several n of 1 experiments to see how much protein he could eat and still remain in ketosis, he found that keeping net carb intake below 20 grams per day was what ultimately mattered regardless of his protein intake.

Clinical experience would suggest that others are likely to have the same results as Bjarte.

If you want to stay in ketosis and still eat plenty of protein and are concerned about potential negative effects, it might be a good idea to conduct your own n of 1 experiments in order to determine your personal protein threshold. It may be higher than you think.

Read more about protein on a ketogenic diet

Getting into ketosis on a ketogenic diet involves a broad range, and you can achieve different degrees of ketosis. The term optimal ketosis is frequently used, but it is poorly defined. For instance, those treating seizures or Alzheimers disease may benefit from targeting a ketone level above 1.5 mmol/L, whereas for losing weight or improving blood sugar the degree of elevation may not matter at all. The numbers below refer to values when testing blood ketone levels.

There are several signs that suggest youre in ketosis, although measuring your ketones is the only objective way to verify it. Here are the most common signs and symptoms:

For a shorter version, keep reading below. Note that we have no affiliations with any of the brands mentioned here.

Urine strips are the simplest and cheapest way to measure ketosis. It is the first option for most beginners on a keto diet.

Dip the strip in your urine, and 15 seconds later the color change will show you the presence of ketones. If you get a high reading (a dark purple color), youll know that youre in ketosis.

Con: Results can vary depending on how much fluid you drink. By drinking more water, you dilute the concentration of ketones in the urine and thus a lower level of ketones will be detected on the strips. Also, the strips dont show a precise ketone level just a range. Finally and most importantly as you become increasingly keto-adapted and your body reabsorbs ketones from the urine, urine strips may become unreliable, even if youre in ketosis.

This happens as the body becomes more adapted to using ketones, meaning that they increasingly stay in the blood to be used as energy instead of being lost through the urine. In one study, after 3 weeks the kidneys were found to excrete ketones at one-third the initial rate, despite having the same blood ketone levels.

Thus, the test may stop working always showing a negative result when youve been in ketosis for several weeks.

Order urine strips at Amazon

Breath-ketone analyzers are a simple way to measure ketones. At $79 and up they are more expensive than urine strips. But they are cheaper than blood-ketone meters in the long run, as they are reusable any number of times.

These analyzers vary in their specific results. Some older models do not give you a precise ketone level; rather, they provide a color code for the general level. Whereas other, newer models, report a specific number or level.

You can also hook the device up to a computer or mobile phone (newer models) to get a more exact ketone number via the app. According to the manufacturer, the device correlates decently with blood ketones in most but not all situations.

Pro: Reusable, simple test.

Con: Does not always correlate well with blood ketones. In some situations may show misleading values. For example, if you recently ate a lot of carbs or drank alcohol, this can result in misleading values. More expensive than urine strips, and higher cost upfront than a blood meter.

Video: Using breath-ketone analyzers

Blood-ketone meters show the exact and current level of ketones in your blood. They are the gold standard method for measuring your level of ketosis on a ketogenic diet. They used to be quite expensive, but prices have come down significantly over the years.

If youre on a keto diet but arent seeing any signs or symptoms of being in ketosis, here are a few strategies that may help:

GuideWith a blood ketone meter, you can test for blood levels of ketones. Heres our review of the top options.

Side effects typically happen within the first few days of starting a ketogenic diet and include headache, fatigue, lightheadedness, irritability, cramps, and constipation. These are known collectively as the keto flu, which can be remedied by managing fluids and electrolytes, among other things. Read more about the keto flu.

Being in ketosis is safe for most people, and it can provide many health benefits, including weight loss and reduction of blood glucose and insulin levels, to name a few.

However, certain individuals should only follow a ketogenic diet under medical supervision, and others are best off avoiding it altogether.

Conditions that require medical supervision and monitoring during ketosis:

Conditions for which ketosis should be avoided:

GuideDuring the first few days of a keto diet, you can experience the keto flu. You can feel tired, have a headache, and be easily annoyed. Learn all about the keto flu and how to avoid it here.

A year of self-tracking in nutritional ketosis

See more here:
What Is Ketosis, What Are the Benefits, and Is It Safe? Diet Doctor