High Calorie Diet Plans

When a person's body requires extra energy to build more muscle, fight off an infection or complete other challenging tasks, it's necessary to eat extra calories. An overabundance of high-calorie processed and prepared items is available at grocery stores and restaurants. The body, however, will benefit more from getting a balance of nutritious, calorie-dense whole foods.

Purpose

One of the most common purposes of high-calorie diet plans is to put on weight. Doctors may prescribe such a plan to someone who is severely underweight and needs to gain mass to stay healthy. According to Lucile Packard Children's Hospital at Stanford, cancer patients may also need extra calories and protein to make their treatments as effective as possible. Columbia University Medical Center adds that patients with Huntington's disease must prevent weight loss by following a high-calorie diet.

Features

A high-calorie diet plan follows the tenets of a regular diet but includes more food or more calorie-dense foods. MayoClinic.com recommends eating servings of whole grains, dairy products, fruits, vegetables and lean proteins to create nutritional balance in the diet and help followers get all of the essential vitamins and minerals they need. The healthiest high-calorie plans also call for participants to limit their intakes of trans fat, saturated fat, cholesterol, added sugar and sodium.

Types

At its basest definition, a high-calorie diet plan is simply a plan that includes more calories than a person of a certain weight and height would normally require. Thus, it's possible to follow a high-calorie plan by eating mainly fast food and restaurant meals, as most such dishes are packed with extra sodium, fat and calories. More balanced plan types that contain a greater number of nutrient-rich foods are available from physicians, fitness centers or registered dietitians.

Foods

Calorie-dense foods are at the heart of a high-calorie diet. The University of Los Angeles's Student Nutrition Action Committee suggests eating dried fruits, starchy vegetables, beans, whole-grain breads, cereal and nuts to boost caloric intake. Ohio State University's Medical Center also recommends that followers pay attention to their liquid intakes and choose to drink juice, smoothies, thin yogurt or milk instead of water, coffee, tea or soda.

Considerations

High-calorie diets are not suitable for everyone and can have negative health consequences for some people, especially if the diets are not balanced. Before beginning any new diet plan, it's advisable to speak with a registered dietitian or physician for personalized advice. To avoid gaining mostly fat with a high-calorie diet, CNN's Dr. Melina Jampolis recommends that all followers exercise and participate in strength training so that they will gain muscle as well.