Overweight women give vegan diet high marks

What if overweight women who wanted to lose weight were placed on either a standard low-fat diet or a very low-fat vegan diet? Which diet would be easier for the women to follow? Which would be more effective? These were some of the questions that Dr. Neal Barnard and co-workers at Physicians' Committee for Responsible Medicine set out to answer. They recruited 59 overweight and obese women and assigned them to a diet with no animal products and with 10 percent of calories from fat or to a non-vegetarian diet with 30 percent or fewer calories from fat. The women were taught about their assigned diets and were expected to follow them for 14 weeks. Both groups lost weight, but the vegan group lost an average of 4 pounds more. Women following the more standard diet reported they felt more constrained and restricted than did women on the vegan diet. Both groups found their diets were acceptable and that foods were easy to prepare. Both groups reported increased energy and improved sleep. More than 85 percent of the women following the vegan diet felt that they could continue with the diet in the future. This study suggests that vegan diets can be acceptable to people who have not followed this type of diet in the past and who are interested in weight loss.

Barnard ND, Scialli AR, Turner-McGrievy G, et al. 2004. Acceptability of a low-fat vegan diet compares favorably to a Step II Diet in a randomized controlled trial. J Cardiopulm Rehab 24:229-35.

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