Scientists from Universitat Autonoma de Barcelona found that a short-term keto diet program can help people with type 2 diabetes lose weight and control blood sugar with good safety and tolerability.
A keto plan centers on fat, which supplies as much as 90% of daily calories. The keto diet is primarily used to help reduce the frequency of epileptic seizures in children.
The diet aims to force your body into using a different type of fuel.
Instead of relying on sugar (glucose) that comes from carbohydrates (such as grains, legumes, vegetables, and fruits), the keto diet relies on ketone bodies, a type of fuel that the liver produces from stored fat.
While the keto diet has been tried for weight loss, only short-term results have been studied, and the safety and tolerability of very-low-calorie keto diets have been a big concern in the treatment of obese people with type 2 diabetes.
In this study, researchers aimed to evaluate the safety and tolerability of a short-term keto diet in an interventional weight loss program.
The weight loss program includes lifestyle and behavioral changes in people with type 2 diabetes.
The team tested 89 men and women, aged between 30 and 65 years, with type 2 diabetes and obesity.
Forty-five people were assigned to the keto diet interventional weight loss program, and 44 to the standard low-calorie diet program. Both programs lasted four months.
The researchers did not find big differences in the safety markers between the two diet groups.
The blood urea nitrogen did not change strongly relative to baseline nor between groups, suggesting the people eating the keto diet had good kidney functions.
The team also found the keto diet group showed much larger weight loss and reduction in waist circumference than in the control diet group.
In addition, the decline in HbA1c and blood sugar control was larger in the keto diet group.
No serious adverse effects were reported in both diet groups.
These findings suggest that the weight loss program based on a keto diet is most effective in reducing body weight and improvement of blood sugar control than a standard diet program.
The keto diet program has safety and good tolerance for people with type 2 diabetes.
The research is published in Nutrition & Diabetes and was conducted by A Goday et al.
Copyright © 2022 Scientific Diet. All rights reserved.
