Wednesday, March 4, 2009

Atkins Diet Tips

By Finn Hailee

The short name for the Atkins nutritional approach is the Atkins diet. It's a low-carb diet created by Robert Atkins. He had gained a lot of weight in medical school. Atkins read about a low-carb diet in one of his medical journals. He decided to improve it and release it under his name.

Atkins, in his Atkins Diet, believed prevailing theories about weight gain were all wrong. He held that saturated fats weren't as bad as people claim. Instead it was carbohydrates that led to the weight problems Americans have. In fact Atkins thought that the focus on fats had made a problem much worse. Many low-fat foods are packed with carbohydrates. Eating a low-fat version of foods was actually less healthy.

The Atkins diet shifts the focus. By cutting out carbohydrates people would burn stored body fats. Lose the fat lose the weight. Atkins flipped the equation from lowering caloric intake. The diet would work because it burned calories. The Atkins diet supposedly burned an extra 950 calories everyday. That sounded good but it wasn't true.

The Atkins diet also could help people with type 2 diabetes.. As opposed to type 1 diabetes, type 2 is often closely associated with diet and people who weigh too much. Therefore, by means of losing weight a person on the Atkins diet would be addressing their type 2 diabetes. In addition the Atkins diet also addresses the measure of taking in fewer carbohydrates which is part of managing type 2 diabetes, so that Dr. Atkins suggested people on his diet would no longer need to monitor their blood sugar or take insulin. But that's counter to the prevailing medical theories regarding type 2 diabetes which, although recommending that lowered intake of carbohydrates and weight loss help manage diabetes, ascribe no causal relationship between carbohydrates and type 2 diabetes.

What are the specific rules of the Atkins diet? It consists of four steps or phases which are induction, ongoing weight loss, pre-maintenance and lifetime maintenance. Here are more details of Induction which is the most crucial of the phases.

The first phase of the Atkins diet, Induction, is like the boot camp for the diet. It lasts for about two weeks. Carbohydrates are nearly removed entirely from the diet, only 15-20 grams can be consumed each day. The lack of carbohydrates will prompt the body to convert fat into fatty acids for fuel - a process known as ketosis. During this phase weight loss can reach as much as 10 pounds per week.

The next three phases of the Atkins diet help establish the levels of carbs people can consume in order to lose weight and to maintain a desired weight. The diet lost popularity after Dr. Atkins died, but it's still popular.

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