From
http://atkinscenter.com/dev/helpatkins/faqs/faqmyths.html
Doesn't all the protein you eat when doing Atkins cause kidney and liver problems?
These are two of the most popular myths perpetuated about Atkins. There are no studies showing that Atkins causes kidney or liver problems in healthy individuals. In fact, at The Atkins Center, we constantly monitor our patients’ lab results for changes in kidney and liver function. There are research trials that looked at liver and kidney and heart function, with participants on ketogenic diets similar to the Atkins approach in which no negative effects were observed. Also, when we did a follow-up of more than a year on patients at The Atkins Center, including checking their kidney and liver functions, there was no adverse effect. Of course patients in kidney failure are extremely restricted in everything they consume, including water, so Atkins would not be appropriate for them
Point being that if you're not predisposed to kidney problems then high protein will be alright.
A lot of people refer to these diets as high protein when they're just as much high-fat as well. That is, if you are executing it properly.
There are many other variations of lowcarb for example protein power by eades, or Bodyopus by Dan Duchaine(R.I.P.).
Lyle McDonald and Elzi Volk are also authorities on these diets. The Ketogenic Diet written by Lyle sites numerous studies thoughtout the entire book that should backup just about any health related questions.
Elzi also knows a ton about thermogenic agents and is one of the primary pioneers in using yohimbine HCL to aid in the lipolytic process.
To be half way objective I'll throw out two other criticisms on these diets and respond also (hey, I said half-way objective)
1) low carbohydrate diets can put the body into a potentially harmful state called ketosis where the blood acidity is too high and unhealthy.
A) Blood acidity is reduced through exercise. Your body will burn up the ketones in the bloodstream and lower the dangerous levels. It's my opinion that these diets are not for the sedentary, but rather athleticly inclined folks. Ketosis is also not to be confused with ketoacidosis. Diabetics can get their bodies into a vicious cycle by not eating enough for a few days and/or drinking alcohol where it burns off everything and is very possibly lethal. Not to mention they will wreak of acetone.
2) Too much fat. This arguement encapsulates all the high fat arguements ever presented. Carcinogenic, arterial blocking, etc etc.
A) My response to this is two-fold. First off when you are sub-caloric, high fat content becomes much less of an issue because your body will use it more directly for energy. Secondly, not all fat is bad. Avoid more hydrogenated and/or saturated fats. Omega 3s and 6s are your friends. They will benefit your skin and your synaptic functionality. Win-win. For information here, I would refer you to an awesome book called Fats the Heal, Fats the Kill by Udo Erasmus. He will explain fats chemically and in their mechanism of action as well as going over some good basic nutrition in the process. Also there is some well deserved critisism of the U.S. SAD (standard american diet) as well.
You can find endless arguements about these diets on usenet. I suggest accumulating all information possible from multiple sources on and offline and then determining where you stand on it rather then taking any of our answeres alone.
To this long post, I'd simply like to propose another thought of mine. Everybody wants a magic bullet. Most people are not willing to be scholars about their own minds and bodies.
For this reason the misinformation-filled fitness industry is overflowing with your money.
I feel that the reason obesity is on the rise is because the common diet information people are given will not necessarily work for them, but HEY.. at least it won't kill them. So let's all propose method X (i.e.: high carb, low fat) as the answer. It might make you fatter and dry your skin out. And make you cranckier and more hunger-craving then lowcarb, but you're alive after you do it.
Lowcarb is potentially dangerous and not for everybody. It shouldnt be advocated as the cure-all. But it isn't a crock by any means. Some people will find a better balance half way along.
For example isocaloric macronutrient ratios like 33/33/33 percent fat/carbs/protein. Or the Zone diet 40/30/30, and so forth.
A good book on customizing your balance for feeling well is The Metabolic Diet by Mauro De Pasquale. It's somewhat of a dry read. He also wrote a book in 95 on how to build muscle while in a low carbohydrate body state called The Anabolic Diet.
I think I'm done. Comments?
Originally posted by hOtTiEcHiK:
The Atkins diet isn't great on your liver and ,obviously, Ecstacy isn't either. Supplementing with milk thistle for healthy liver function may help...but other than that....you should be fine!!!!![]()
[ 04 April 2002: Message edited by: hOtTiEcHiK ]
From the website:
Dr. McDougall is the author of several national bestsellers including: The McDougall Plan: 12 Days to Dynamic Health, McDougall's Medicine:A Challenging Second Opinion, The McDougall Program for Maximum Weight Loss, The New McDougall Cookbook, The McDougall Program for Women, and his latest ground breaking book, The McDougall Program for a Healthy Heart. He has a nationally syndicated television show ("McDougall, M.D.") as well as a syndicated weekly talk radio program ("Your Good Health"(On Sabbatical)) .
He has much commercial interest to his arguements. Hey lets all get 'dynamically healthy' in 12 days? hehe The guy is a vegaterian diet advocate. Of course he's going to be extremely down on low-carbing.
His artical begins to debunk the high-animal content of the diets with the headline "Sickening Foods". Nice wording..
Then goes onto say
The diseases believed to be caused by meats, egg, and dairy products include most cases of: obesity, heart diseases, adult diabetes, breast, colon, and prostate cancer, gallbladder disease, osteoporosis, kidney failure, kidney stones, multiple sclerosis, rheumatoid arthritis, constipation, diverticulosis, hemorrhoids, and hiatal hernia to name a few well studied diseases. You don't have to be a trained nutritionist to see the risk of becoming sick increases the more of these unhealthy foods that are eaten--like with high-protein diets.
Typical vegetarian arguements. Note he has no studies referenced after his paragraph starts in with the words: "The diseases believed to be caused..."
He sites no studies about high protein causing danage to healthy kidneys. When he does site are two studies from 1982 and 1976 about how well the liver functions in people over 80.
He goes on about bone density loses and all sorts of posibilities that can happen if somebody does one of these diets, in fact, incorrectly.
Generally speaking, low carb advocates as a whole do not put much faith in the current dietary beliefs of the medical community. This are slowly changing because people actually are starting to doubt the last word of a given doctor and can much better to the research for themselves these days. At least McDougall sites some studies. That's a lot better then many critics do.
He sites a total of about fifteen studies in his "great debate". I have a book with hundreds of studies that would counter most of his claims. (The Ketogenic Diet a Reference for Physicians and Dieters). Most of them newer studies then his arguements present. I find myself on here again on work's time, and hence not anywhere near my bookshelf![]()
If you really like, I will find the time to discect his article on any key points you're especially curious about, and provide a few references.
Despite the domain name, this place will multiple mcdougall vs atkins vs everyone else arguements exponentially if you'd like to find 20 other people just as convincing as mcdougall or 20 just as convincing to the contrary:
Low carb pro/con studies and opinions of medical people
I'm all for friendly exchange of information, honestly.
While it's funny this subject come up while there are other threads currently going on in this forum about people having jaundiced skin from taking MDMA but I'd sooner attribute that to pre-existing conditions being worsened.
I'd like to counter your last point about users predisposing themselves to liver damage by using MDMA.
I'm not going to say it doesn't cause damage. There's little evidence against that, also.
But I would never make a claim that ecstasy use predisposes people to liver problems. There just isnt anything besides some empyrical case studies to that point.
Here's one quote from dancesafe:
While there is little evidence that MDMA causes liver damage on its own, people with hepatitis or other liver ailments may be vulnerable to liver damage if they consume MDMA.
While dancesafe could again have their own agenda. There are only five study abstracts on PUBMED/MEDLINE that even have the keywords "MDMA" and "liver" in them. This is about the best information I could even come up with.
Erowid was also pretty devoid of hepatoxicity information.
have a nice day,
Here's some info I found recently on high-protein/low-carb
I would like to stress two things initially. There are many kinds of low carbohydrate diets. I specialize in some of the ketogenic variations. You'll find these are done in a very educated and responsible action by those who are willing to learn about the interworkings of the body.
Secondly any lowcarb diet is a high-fat diet *as well* as high-protein. If a low carb diet is low in fat also, it is being executed incorrectly and will more likely yeild unhealthy results.
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Claim 1: weight-loss is due to the composition (high-protein, low-carb) of the diet.
Well, the weightloss *is* due to the composition of the diet. Any weightloss on any diet that one looses weight on is due to the composision of that diet, silly.![]()
Answer: The only healthy way to reduce weight is to consume less energy than you expend.
I agree. This is a fair enough statement. Liposuction or over-eating and still loosing weight by some wierd break in the laws of thermodynamics surely must be unhealthy.
Either reduce food intake, increase exercise, or both. The Atkins Diet recommends a consumption of 1400 calories a day - which is less energy than one needs.
This is less energy then *WHO* needs. There are so many variables here that I'd gladly reply but this would need a thread of it's own. How much does 'one' weigh, and how fast is 'one's metabolism? heh. Atkins is bad. So is the dude for replying to it.
Okay I tried not to reply but I'll at least say this:
Most tissues of the body can use FFA for fuel if it is available. This includes skeletal muscle, the heart, and most organs.
The fact that the brain is incapable of using FFA for fuel has lead to one of the biggest misconceptions about human physiology: that the brain can only use glucose for fuel. While it is true that the brain normally runs on glucose, the brain will readily use ketones for fuel if they are available (ref 1-3)
Therefore - weight loss - but not because of the composition of the diet, as Atkins claimed.
I'm sorry but this Claim #1 didn't get from A to C by having any sort of meaningful B. Any questions on why I feel it didn't prove what it was trying to?
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Claim 2 relates to the role of insulin in weight loss - Atkins claims it has a role, evidence suggests otherwise.
Okay. Lets talk about hormones for a second here. Insulin is storage hormone, responsible for moving nutrients out of the bloodstream and into target tissues. For example, insulin causes glucose to be stored in muscle as glycogen, and FFA (free fatty acids) to be stored as adipose tisue. Glucagon is a fuel-mobilizing hormone, stimulating the body to break down stored glycogen, especially in the liver, to provide glucose for the body.
Now, when carbohydrates are removed from the diet, insulin levels decrease, and glucagon levels increase. This causes an increase in FFA release from fat cells, and increased FFA burning in the liver. The accelerated FFA burning in the liver is what ultimately leads to the production of ketone bodies and the metabolic state of ketosis. In addition to insulin and glucagon, a number of other hormones are affected, all of which help to shift fuel use away from carbohydrates and towards fat.
So, there are at least 4 distinct fuels which the body can use: glucose, protein, FFA, and ketones. In general the tissues of the body will use a given fuel in proportion to it's concentration in the bloodstream. So if a given fuel (i.e. glucose) increases in the bloodstream, the body will utilize that fuel in preference to others. By decreasing carbohydrate availability, the ketogenic diet shifts the body to using fat as it's primary fuel.
As long as liver and glycogen stores are not completey filled, the body is able to store or burn off excess dietary carbohydrates. Of course this process occurs at the expense of limiting fat burning, meaning that any dietary fat which is cingested with a high carbohydrate intake is stored as a fat.
This has lead some authors to suggest an absolute minimization of dietary fat for weight loss. (ref 4,5). The presmise is that, since incoming carbohydrate will block fat burning by the bodym, less fat must be eaten to avoid storage. The ketogenic diet approaches this problem from the opposite direction. By reducing carbohydrate intake to minimum levels, fat utilization by the body is maximed.
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Claim 3: weight loss is the result of fat loss.
Response: The weight lost from such a diet is due to water loss.
A well established fact is that low-carbohydrate diets tend to cause a rapid loss of water in the first few days. This occurs for several reasons. First and foremost, glycogen is stored along with water in a ratio of three grams of water for every gram of stored carbohydrate (ref 6). As glycogen is depleted, water is lost. For large individuals, this can represent a lot of weight.
Due to confusions about weight loss and fat loss, many individuals are drawn to low-carbohydrate diets specifically for the rapid initial loss of water weight. During the first few days of a ketogenic diet, water loss has been measured from 4.5 to 15lbs (ref 7-10).
Although transient, this rapid inital weight loss can provide psychological incentive for dieters, which may mean greater compliance with the diet. In one study of subjects on a very low-calorie ketogenic diet adhered to their diet much more then individuals consuming more carbohydrate, and who lost less weight (ref 11).
Remember, subcaloric intake is that makes one lose weight. Even if they're on a whackey 'high-protein diet'. They will lose weight besides water.
As soon as the diet is stopped, this weight will be regained.
It is well known that dieting alone shows extremely poor rates of long term success. Typically less then 5-10% of individuals who lose weight through dieting alone will maintain that weight loss in the long term. In brief, the fat loss efforst based on caloric restriction alone are typically bound for failure, regardless of wheather the diet used is ketogenic or not.
While this COULD be true of ANY diet, the statement assumes many things. 1) The person has no plan to exercise different or eat different after they are done with the diet. Or hey, maybe even a lifestyle change. This has nothing specific to do with lowcarb what-so-ever. I can think of a dozen scenarios that would make it true or false.
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Adverse effects listed include: calcium loss, ketosis and inadequate nutrition.
Ketosis isn't necessarily, or even commonly, adverse. I responded to this arguement earlier in the thread.
Inadequate nutrition? That's an adverse effect of any diet done wrongly. You know enough about food in general from the sounds of your post to know there are foods with trace carbs that will still provide nutrition and supplements incase otherwise.
So this leaves us with calcium loss. A general belief states that high protein diets may be a causative factor in osteoporosis but this is still highly debated (ref 12,13) While studies have shown increased calcium excretion with high protein intakes, this was typically with 'purified' proteins (ref 14). It is thought that wholefood proteins do not cause this to occur as the high phosphate content prevents calcium losses. (ref 14)
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Also see 'Carbohydrate: friend or foe?' by Melinda Manore in ACSM's Health and Fitness Journal, 60 (1), Jan/Feb 2002, 33-35. This also refutes the idea that carbohydrates are the 'bad guy'.
Ah yes. It's very easy to villify the macronutrient that we're trying to avoid for a given diet. Analogues to this, 'fat is bad' in our standard high carb diets. Nevermind weather the fat is transfigured, cisfigured, hydrogenized, long chain, short chain, or even as essential fatty acid like ALA/LA.
So lets establish a quick principal. Your body needs certain things dietarily. The more you eat quantity wise, the more likely you're getting everything your body needs and more. The less you eat, the more important food choices become for the sake of defficiencies. Do you agree?
If so, now lets talk about macronutrients. Lets see... we have Carbohydrates, Protein, and Fats. There are most certainly essential amino acids. So we could never eliminate protein from a diet. There are also, as mentioned above, essentialy fatty acids. Prolonged elimination of either protein or fat from the diet will kill us. period.
Now that being said, can you name me *anything* in the way of an essential carbohydrate? Some sugar or starch that is going to mess us up bigtime if we don't eat it? The fact is that one can eliminate carbohydrates with no ill effects when done properly. It requires intelligence moreso then other diets to do right.
Carbohydrates are not the 'bad guy' persay, but if we're carefully choosing what goes in subcalorically, we can certainly get rid of it in light of more nutritional food.
The recipe for weight loss is simple: eat plenty of grains, fruit and vegetables, smaller amounts of meat, poultry, fish and dairy products. Don't eat big meals, don't eat too many fried, or processed, high-sugar foods. Exercise 30 minutes a day.
Of course it's not near that simple. But lets tell people who can't be bothered with spending excessive time to learn about nutrition and health something that won't harm them if they don't listen too close and get only half of it right. They'll just do poorly in losing weight. So, I can't argue your advice there.
There's no need for special diets or magic bullets, its just down to taking some responsibility for your own health.
Here I have to downright disagree. There are these needs. People with chrons disease benefit greatly from these types of diets. So do certain diabetics. Epileptic children who are so severe that the strongest medications cannot help are kept on these diets for 5 or more years with no problems. But alas we go back to the scope of weightloss. I'm saving much bandwidth without getting into my specific needs and benefits from a cyclic-ketogenic diet. Just look up CKD or bodyopus if you want to know what it does for me that another diet cannot.
Let alone preferences. When you put somebody on fat and protein they just simply consume subcaloricly. The cravings are less with these food choices. Going high carb low calorie makes me, and many other people cranky and craving more food all the time.
After about 3 weeks of adaptation where you possibly feel shitty on lowcarbs . . once your body learns to work with them the mood is generally much better on such a diet.
Now if I were a more sensitive person, I'd be insulted and maybe even resentful that you suggest a person on a low carbohydrate diet is irresponsible.
Thanks for your time and I hope we both possibly draw new knowledge from this thread.
Reference Footnotes
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1. Owen O.E. et. al. Brain metabolism during fasting. J Clin Invest (1967) 10: 1589-1595.
2. Sokoloff L. Metabolism of ketone bodies by the brain. Ann Rev Med (1973) 24: 271-280
3. Cahill G. Ketosis. Kidney International (1981) 20: 416-425
4. Flatt JP. Use and storage of carbohydrate and fat. Am J Clin Nutr (1995) 61(suppl): 952S-959S
5. Flatt JP. McCollum Award Lecture, 1995: Diet, lifestyle, and weight maintenance. Am J Clin Nutr (1995) 62: 820-836
6. "Textbook of Biochemistry with Clinical Correlations 4th ed." Ed. Thomas M. Devlin. Wiley-Liss 1997.
7. Phinney SD et. al. The human metabolic response to chronic ketosis without caloric restriction: Physical and biochemical adaptations. Metabolism (1983) 32: 757-768
8. Olsson KE and Saltin B. Variations in total body water with muscle glycogen changes in man. Acta Physiol Scand (1970) 80: 11-18
9. Pilkington TRE et. al. Diet and weight reduction in the obese. Lancet (1960) 1: 856-858.
10. Kreitzman SN et. al. Glycogen storage: illusions of easy weight loss, excessive weight regain, and distortions in estimates of body composition. Am J Clin Nutr (1992) 56: 292S-293S.
11. Krietzman S. Factors influencing body composition during very-low-calorie diets. Am J Clin Nutr (1992) 56 (suppl): 217S-223S
12. Heaney RP. Excess dietary protein may not adversely affect bone. J Nutr (199 8) 128:1054-1057.
13. Barzel US and Massey LK Excess dietary protein can adversely affect bone. J Nutr (199 8) 128:1051-1053
14. Lemon P. Is increased dietary protein necessary or beneficial for individuals with a physically active lifestyle? Nutrition Reviews (1996) 54: S169-S175.
Idiocy should be a crime
Do me a favour, please? Just refute my arguments, don't name call - I was quoting from articles published in refereed scientific journals (as cited). I wouldn't pretend to be an expert.
Also, as far as how healthy a low carb diet is. Do you think sugar is healthy? Do you think we were designed to eat grains? Try and eat a stock of raw wheat and tell me how you like it. Do you think our ancestors ate it? Doubtful. Animal proteins were our main source of sustainance, supplemented with nuts and berries, occasional fruits and vegetables.
I've seen this quoted by supporters of various low-carb diets, and it's one of the things that makes me distrust them. Animal proteins were not our main source of sustainance. They accounted for maybe 10% of calorie intake, if I recall my introduction to anthropology course correctly. And of course I don't think sugar is healthy (at least in large doses) - but I never said that.