The Ensure company makes a variety of nutritional supplement products and shakes that are intended to help preserve bone and muscle health, boost daily protein intake or act as meal replacements. When you use them in concert with a balanced diet, Ensure products can help you cut calories enough to spur successful weight loss.
Benefits
Ensure shakes may make the most difference if you drink them to replace one or two regular meals per day. According to 2003 research from Columbia University, Dr. Steven Heymsfield and colleagues found that overweight and obese study participants who drank a nutrition shake or used another type of meal replacement lost more weight over a 12-week period than subjects who followed a standard low-calorie diet and did not replace any meals with shakes.
Nutrition Facts
Ensure shakes contain modest calorie and fat counts, making them relatively healthy choices. According to Ensure.com, an 8-oz. bottle of the rich dark chocolate nutrition shake has a total of about 250 calories, 6 g fat, 200 mg sodium, 41 g carbohydrates, 1 g fiber, 18 g sugar and 9 g protein. The shake's primary ingredients include water, sugar, corn syrup, milk protein, soy protein and oil.
How to Use
At 250 calories each, the Ensure shakes may seem like fantastic ways to cut your daily calorie totals, but they may not provide enough substance for most people to successfully replace a full meal. "Cooking Light" magazine's registered dietitian Maureen Callahan notes that 250-calorie packages, such as shakes and bars, work best when supplemented with real food to form a small meal. Try replacing one meal per day with an Ensure shake, a piece of fresh fruit and a few crackers with low-fat cheese or nut butter. For the best results, use that meal replacement during the time of day when you normally eat your largest meal, since that will help you cut the highest number of calories.
Considerations
You must burn or save a total of 3,500 calories to lose 1 lb. That means if you can manage to cut 500 calories from your daily diet by serving smaller portions and replacing a single meal with Ensure and a snack or two, you'll drop about a pound per week. However, don't drink Ensure at the expense of sacrificing variety in your diet. The National Institutes of Health recommends having items from every major food group at each meal if you're trying to lose weight; leaving out major groups could result in nutrient deficiencies, fatigue or more serious health problems. Before you start using Ensure, talk with your doctor.
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