Is the crash diet back? Science now suggests that rapidly losing a lot of weight could be a beneficial strategy for health – if you do it carefully.
the idea of following medical advice to go slowly when we start a diet – about half a kilogram to 1kg a week – just isn’t appealing. In fact, if you enter “how to lose weight fast” into a Google search, there are 2.3 billion results. When it comes to weight loss, we just aren’t prepared to play the long game.
When this is achieved, stored fat in our body is used to meet energy needs, and the scales register weight loss. The greater the energy restriction, the faster the weight comes off, but the more challenging it becomes to get all the nutrients needed for good health. “Anything under 1200 calories won’t be nutritionally balanced and risks being low in protein, vitamins and minerals,” confirms Dr Brown.
Another benefit of exercise is its role in maintaining muscle. “Many people worry about the loss of lean mass or muscle that occurs with rapid weight loss, but proportionally we still lose far more fat than muscle when we lose weight quickly, and that’s better for health,” explains Dr King. However, including exercise in a weight-loss plan – particularly resistance training – can reduce the loss of muscle.
That’s not to say we should dismiss dieting for a deadline. Currently, 64 per cent of people in England are overweight or obese, and rapid weight loss due to a dramatic reduction in calories – even if the motivation is to look good or feel more confident – may improve health, especially in anyone with high blood pressure, high cholesterol or type 2 diabetes.
Rapid weight loss – usually defined as losing more than 2lb a week over several weeks – can also cause side effects, such as constipation, fatigue, lack of energy, nausea, dizziness, poor concentration and headaches, but these are normally mild and temporary. It also increases the risk of gallstones, although people with a BMI over 30 already have a higher chance of developing them.One area of concern has historically focused on the impact of fast weight loss on heart health.
After 18 months, both groups had regained a little, but compared with the start of the study, the slow and rapid groups still had overall losses of 3.7kg and 10.9kg respectively. The conclusion: fast dieters lost almost three times as much weight and were no more susceptible to regaining it than slow dieters.
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