Diet Plans

There are thousands of diets available in books and on the internet.

Which diet(s) work?

How do you know they work?

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WebMD lists and describes 50 popular diet plans on their site.

These plans include fad or gimmick diets such as The Cabbage Soup Diet, the Grapefruit Diet, 3 Day Diet, and 3-Hour Diet, etc.

They also include some of the highly promoted commercial diet plans, such as Jenny Craig, NutriSystem, Weight Watchers, etc.

In future updates on this blog site, I’ll discuss many of these diet plans, individually.

After the jump, let’s briefly look at some of the diet plans that seem to be in the news: Atkins, Ornish (The Spectrum), South Beach, and the Zone Diets.

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All of these descriptions are quotes from WebMD. To see the complete WebMD articles, click on the highlighted name of the diet plan.

Atkins Diet
“The diet is based on the theory that overweight people eat too many carbohydrates. Our bodies burn both fat and carbohydrates for energy, but carbs are used first. By drastically reducing carbs and eating more protein and fat, our bodies naturally lose weight by burning stored body fat more efficiently.”

“By restricting carbohydrates drastically to a mere fraction of that found in the typical American diet, the body goes into a state of ketosis, which means it burns its own fat for fuel. A person in ketosis is getting energy from ketones, little carbon fragments that are the fuel created by the breakdown of fat stores. When the body is in ketosis, you tend to feel less hungry, and thus you're likely to eat less than you might otherwise. However, ketosis can also cause a variety of unpleasant effects (such as unusual breath odor and constipation) in a small number of people.”

“As a result, your body changes from a carbohydrate-burning engine into a fat-burning engine. So instead of relying on the carbohydrate-rich items you might typically consume for energy, and leaving your fat stores just where they were before (alas, the hips, belly, and thunder thighs are popular fat-gathering spots), your fat stores become a primary energy source. The purported result: weight loss.”


Ornish Diet
“ Dr. Ornish is well known in the medical community because of his success in reversing blockages to the heart, once thought impossible without surgery or drugs. …

Ornish's main point is that eating a high-fiber, low-fat vegetarian diet will not only help you stay healthy, or get you there, but also will help you lose weight. …

This is accomplished, according to Ornish, by a combination of diet and exercise that allows the body's fat-burning mechanism to work most effectively. …

He advises not to worry about restricting calories, but rather be careful about the foods we eat. …

He provides a list of foods that should be eaten all of the time, some of the time, and none of the time.”


The Spectrum
“(Dr Ornish’s) latest book, The Spectrum, is a lifestyle and diet program that can be tailored to suit almost everyone. Whether you want to reduce your risk of prostate cancer, lose weight, or maintain your waistline, you figure out where you fit on the spectrum, (hence the book title) and make changes accordingly. Along with eating more nutritious foods, The Spectrum lifestyle plan also calls for regular exercise, stress reduction, and meditation.”


South Beach Diet
“The father of the South Beach diet is cardiologist Arthur Agatston, MD. … Both South Beach and Atkins diets restrict carbohydrates … True, "good carbs" are allowed. But South Beach dieters must say goodbye to potatoes, fruit, bread, cereal, rice, pasta, beets, carrots, and corn for the first two weeks. After that, most of these foods remain strongly discouraged.

Both South Beach and Atkins diets have a more severe induction phase, followed by a long-term eating plan. … The difference, really, boils down to two things:

* Fats. The South Beach diet bans unhealthy fats but strongly promotes healthy ones.
* Carbs. The South Beach diet doesn't count grams of carbs. The Atkins diet seeks to change a person from a sugar-burning machine into a fat-burning machine. The South Beach diet looks at how much sugar is in a carb. Low-sugar carbs -- those with a low glycemic index (they don't cause the blood sugar levels to rise and fall as quickly) -- are good …”


The Zone Diet
“… according to author Barry Sears, PhD … The Zone diet offers more than just weight-loss claims. By retooling your metabolism with a diet that is 30% protein, 30% fat, and 40% carbohydrates, The Zone diet contends that you can expect to turn back encroaching heart disease, high blood pressure, and diabetes. Another much-touted advantage is better athletic performance. …”

“... Put simply, the Zone is a "metabolic state in which the body works at peak efficiency," and that state is created by eating a set ratio of carbohydrates, protein, and fat.”

“The Zone Diet: What You Can Eat”

“The Zone diet does not recommend that you eat fewer calories than you're currently consuming, just different ones. …”

“* A small amount of protein at every meal (approximately the size of your palm or one small chicken breast) and at every snack (one in the late afternoon, one in the late evening)

“* "Favorable" carbohydrates twice the size of the protein portion -- these include most vegetables and lentils, beans, whole grains, and most fruits”

“* A smaller amount of carbohydrates if you have chosen "unfavorable" ones -- these include brown rice, pasta, papaya, mango, banana, dry breakfast cereal, bread, bagel, tortilla, carrots, and all fruit juices.”

“Dairy products are not verboten, but The Zone diet devotes little time to them, except to explain how quickly they release glucose. Sears prefers egg whites and egg substitutes to whole eggs, and low-fat or no-fat cheeses and milk.”

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For me, the list and descriptions of these different diet plans DID NOT ANSWER my basic questions:

Which one works?

How do you know?

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(more posts on Diet Plans … )