Thursday, January 22, 2009

Why Is The Atkins Diet Still So Popular

By Cathy Maree

Many people have heard of the Atkins diet, the short name for Atkins nutritional approach. Dr. Robert Atkins invented this low-carb diet. He put on a lot of pounds while he attended medical school. He read about this diet in the medical journal. He built on that diet and eventually made it popular.

Dr. Atkins had rather radical theories about the nature of weight gain as expressed in the Atkins diet. He disagreed that saturated fats were the problem. Carbohydrates, found in potatoes, and breads, were the real problem. Atkins held that our obsession with fat actually worsened the problem. Carbohydrates are used to make up for the lack of fat in low fat foods. Dieters were being tricked into eating foods that would cause them to gain more weight.

The Atkins diet shifts the focus. Once Carbohydrates were removed from a diet, people would burn more stored body fat. Lose the fat lose the weight. It's not just a matter of eating less. Now it was all about what your diet can help you burn. The Atkins diet supposedly burned an extra 950 calories everyday. But the claims were not true.

Dr. Atkins also touted the positive influence this Atkins diet could have on 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.

But the Atkins diet is also low in carbohydrates, which must be avoided with type 2 diabetes regardless of caloric intake, so by means of this aspect of the diet Atkins claimed those who suffer type 2 diabetes would no longer need medication such as insulin. The jury is still out in the medical world as to the causes of type 2 diabetes. So while science agrees with Atkins that lowering intake of Carbohydrates will help with the disease, it would disagree that the step alone would remove the necessity for medicine.

What are the specific rules of the Atkins diet? Induction, ongoing weight loss, pre-maintenance and lifetime maintenance are the four necessary phases of the diet. Here is an overview of the most important phase - Induction.

The first phase of the Atkins diet, Induction, is like the boot camp for the diet. Atkins is flexible as to the time period but recommends two weeks. During this phase carbohydrates are severely limited only up to 20 grams per day. The lack of carbohydrates will prompt the body to convert fat into fatty acids for fuel a process known as ketosis. Weight loss during this phase can be extreme some Atkins followers reported losses of 5-10 pounds a 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. Millions of people are still losing weight on this diet but beware the dangers of taking in too much fat. - 15343

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