It’s not a secret that low calorie diet is not only effectual in treating obesity but also maintaining a healthy balance. To the best of our knowledge, a low calorie diet can consist of 1000 to 1800 calories per day. In short, with the help of this diet, one can manage his weight. It is important to note that the expert health practitioners and doctors recommend the healthy diet depending on individualized needs to meet the weight-loss goals. As you may know, in a standard adult body weight, the daily protein intake should be around 0.8gm per kg of standard body weight. In fact, if the diet doesn’t consist of 1200 calories, vitamin supplements may become essential. So far as is known, expert medical practitioners or dieticians propose the low calorie diet depending on patient’s eating behavior, preparation of food, meal prototype, usual food share capability, nutritional sufficiency, exercise and other relevant factors. On the other hand, with a satisfactory output by analyzing the above factors, doctors then recommend individual program for attaining and maintaining ideal weight. Actually, feeling hungry is too common among individuals on low calorie diet. In order to fulfill this need, patients are recommended to satisfy their appetite with low calorie foods such as raw vegetables, broth, black tea or coffee or any other sugar free beverages. On the other hand, if the patient is not suffering from any sort of cardiac problem or edema, physicians usually do not recommend sodium restricted diet.
So, let’s look at it closer: VLCD or very low calorie diet is generally recommended to severely obese people for the purpose of short term weight loss. As a matter of fact, it is also effective for moderately obese individuals. According to the statistics, VLCD allows an average weight loss of 3 to 5 pounds per week. You need also to be aware of that that not only weight loss, but VLCD also aids in alleviating a whole host of medical conditions such as diabetes, high blood pressure, and high cholesterol. It is obvious that when you take a closer look at this issue that VLCD is plainly great for short term weight loss, however, modest dietary restrictions intended for long term benefits are found to be more effective than that of VLCD. What is more important, the combination of VLCD with exercise and cognitive-behavioral therapy can offer a long term weight loss benefit. It is very important to take into account that the cognitive-behavioral therapy helps in recognizing the cause of the problem and guides for corresponding moderation in eating behavior pattern.
Please call to mind that VLCD is not suitable for everyone. The thing is that if you are suffering from obesity and the BMI or Body Mass Index is greater than 30, you may be supervised with VLCD under proper medical condition. However, as far as this issue is concerned, BMI less than 30 may not be recommended for VLCD unless prevalent medical conditions occurred due to obesity problem. Don’t you know that VLCD is recommended by the doctor precisely on case-by-case basis. One should make sure that only receiving proper medical guidance from your doctor, you can switch to very low calorie diet. Besides, you cannot depend on VLCD if you are pregnant or if you practice breastfeeding. Typically, if we are making a closer investigation of this problem, it is not recommended to the growing age, children and adolescents, expect they do not belong to any specialized treatment plan. You must bear in mind that this diet is also not suitable for people over 50 years of age due to several age-related factors such as preexisting medicinal conditions, possible side-effects, etc.
In addition, it should be also pointed out that typically, minor side effects such as diarrhea, constipation, fatigue and nausea are reported from individuals on VLCD for 4-6weeks. Don’t be afraid: these complications are indeed short-term and people can improve health conditions rapidly. As far as is known, these problems generally do not prevent individuals in finishing the diet program noteworthy. The other useful point to add is that there are serious side effects involved with VLCD as well. Actually, the most serious among all is gallstone formation. It’s self-evident that during soon weight loss, it is common to see developing gallstone, especially in the case of obese women. It has long been known that the rapid weight loss slows down the gallbladder’s ability for bile contraction. Indeed, it is a serious health complication, but no research has yet confirmed whether VLCD is directly responsible for the occurrence of gallstone or the amount of rapid weight loss causes the problem even in diets for men.
Beyond any doubt, to maintain good health, a proper balance of food from different food groups is needed. As far as my personal experience can be taken into account, getting good nutrition is difficult in as few as 800 calories and it becomes fatal if someone only depends on such diet day after day. One of the operative advices for you to know is that whenever you come out from the low calorie diet, you have every possibility to regain weight if you do not maintain healthy eating practice, physical exercise, along with an improved outlook towards your eating pattern.
Read more about diets for men on the diets for men blog.
