From the Bariatric Surgery - weight loss thread:
I found the complete BBC episode here
Basically the gist of the show was that the main point of intermittent fasting is to stay healthy longer, or age well. Although the host did lose weight, that did not appear to be the main focus of eating for 5 days and "fasting" for two. The fasting is actually a very restricted diet of less than 600 calories for men and 500 calories for women, as dlorde said above.
However, after taking a quick look at pubmed to see if I could find any studies to support the episode, I found this abstract published in 2009 which said:
I didn't happen to see anything that supported the BBC show but I'm not knowledgeable about this area and I can find wading through pubmed tough going sometimes. Anybody know more about studies in this area?
There's increasing evidence that partial fast regimes are very effective, e.g. alternate days, or the more attractive 5+2 regime, consisting of two days 'fasting' (less than 600 cals/day) and five days eating normally (no restrictions at all). This kind of regime doesn't have the continuous hunger or difficult food preparation or monotony of most diets. It appears that on their 'eat anything' days people generally don't overcompensate, only eating a little more than their previous norm. Check out 'Eat, Fast and Live Longer'.
I found the complete BBC episode here
Basically the gist of the show was that the main point of intermittent fasting is to stay healthy longer, or age well. Although the host did lose weight, that did not appear to be the main focus of eating for 5 days and "fasting" for two. The fasting is actually a very restricted diet of less than 600 calories for men and 500 calories for women, as dlorde said above.
However, after taking a quick look at pubmed to see if I could find any studies to support the episode, I found this abstract published in 2009 which said:
IF (my edit: intermittent fasting) does not affect whole-body glucose, lipid, or protein metabolism in healthy lean men despite changes in muscle phosphorylation of GSK and mTOR. The decrease in resting energy expenditure after IF indicates the possibility of an increase in weight during IF when caloric intake is not adjusted. This study was registered at www.trialregister.nl as NTR1841.
I didn't happen to see anything that supported the BBC show but I'm not knowledgeable about this area and I can find wading through pubmed tough going sometimes. Anybody know more about studies in this area?
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