Organizations such as the American Heart Association take a dim view of diet regimens to lose weight fast. Although the AHA is not alone in their opinion, these types of diets permeate the weight-loss marketplace regardless of whether or not they are a healthy or effective way to lose weight. To avoid disappointing results or even worse, putting your health at risk, get information essential for making a wise and healthy choice.
Types
A quick weight-loss or fad diet regimen is any regimen that promotes weight loss of more than 2 lbs. a week. Examples of types you may recognize are food-specific diets such as the cabbage soup diet, liquid diets and a variety of diet pills or supplements that work to suppress your appetite and limit calorie intake that way.
Calorie Requirements
Although all quick weight-loss regimens feature reduced calorie intake some go as low as 400 to 800 calories a day. In contrast, the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute and National Institutes of Health recommend healthy weight-loss plans that feature a daily calorie intake of about 1,000 to 1,200 calories a day for women and 1,200 to 1,600 calories a day for men.
Nutrition
Diet regimens that advocate quick weight loss violate principals of good nutrition and health. Quick weight-loss diets do not provide balanced nutrition, as they usually focus on a specific food or food group while excluding or strictly limiting others. Although these types of diets quickly lead to monotony and abandonment, if you do stay on one for even a few weeks, you run the risk of developing nutritional deficiencies.
Success Rate
Weight you lose rapidly is weight that usually returns. These diets typically do not provide a way to help you maintain weight loss. Instead, they either radically change your eating patterns or make promises of quick weight loss without having to make any changes at all. Either way, lack of education combined with the short time you follow the diet usually result in a return to old eating habits and a return to your starting weight.
Considerations
A final consideration about diet regimens concerns exercise. Many do not address this topic at all, or tell you that you can accomplish weight-loss goals without following an exercise program. Exercise should be an integral part of your life whether you are in the process of losing or maintaining weight. Inactivity not only makes weight loss more difficult, but also increases your risk for developing heart disease.
Solution
Before you choose a weight-loss program, MayoClinic.com recommends evaluating it by getting information relating to diet guidelines and requirements, the credibility of its developers, any potential health risks associated with the diet, support options and the credibility of results information.
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