How Keto Compares to Other Diets to Lose Fat

The ketogenic diet or the keto diet is a low-carbohydrate, high-fat diet which helps to lose fat. Avoiding food, particularly carbohydrates, for extended periods causes your body to believe that food is scarce, and it responds by making numerous changes to become more efficient with your energy.

People have been following ketogenic diets unknowingly for as long as they have roamed the globe. Before the invention of agriculture, when humans had to hunt and collect their food, it was typical to fast for extended periods. Humans consumed primarily fat and protein meals, with only a few carbs coming from berries and vegetables.

The keto diet’s first modern use began in the 1920s, as an effective treatment for epilepsy in children for whom medication was inadequate. Today, the keto diet also shows promising results for cancer, diabetes, polycystic ovarian syndrome (PCOS), and Alzheimer’s disease.

In particular, because of the low-carb diet trend that began in the 1970s with the Atkins diet, this diet is garnering significant interest as a viable weight-loss technique. Let’s look at this more closely, and you can compare how keto compares to weight watchers on sites such as PlanKeto.

How the Keto Diet Works?

A ketogenic diet, like the Atkins Diet, is very low in carbohydrates. The majority of calories in a ketogenic diet come from fat, while protein consumption is lower. This is how it works: most people get the majority of their calories from carbohydrates, therefore restricting carbs and increasing fats tells the body that it has to alter fuel sources.

The liver begins to convert fat—both the fat you eat and the fat you keep in your body—into molecules known as ketones. When the quantity of ketones in your bloodstream reaches a particular threshold, you are officially in “ketosis.” At this time, your body’s major energy source is fat.

In the medically defined ketogenic diet, fat accounts for 75% of daily calorie intake, protein accounts for 20%, and carbohydrates account for 5%. However, the majority of the advantages of ketosis may be obtained by consuming additional, modest amounts of carbohydrates post-exercise. The medical paradigm of 5% carbohydrate is very restrictive, especially if you exercise.

If you wish, you can follow a more moderate version of the ketogenic diet. For most people, a modified version works well, in which 40-60% of your calories come from fat, 20-40% from protein, and the remaining 20% from carbohydrates. We name this strategy, which appears to be more practical and sustainable for most people, Mod Keto.

While Mod Keto won’t put you in ketosis, it will maintain your insulin levels low enough to stimulate fat loss and mental focus, while still providing enough energy for intense activities. Perhaps most importantly, you’ll be able to eat a larger variety of foods than you could on a traditional ketogenic diet.

Positive Effects of the Ketogenic Diet on Weight Loss:

A ketogenic diet can help you lose more weight in the first three to six months than other diets. This is because the energy expended to convert fat into energy is greater than the energy required to convert carbohydrates into energy. In other words, it is more difficult and burdensome for fat to become energy.

Also, another reason why this diet helps to lose weight faster is that foods with high protein and fat content make you feel more full and eat less food.

In the short term, the ketogenic diet has been shown to generate positive metabolic alterations. Along with weight reduction, other health markers improve, such as insulin resistance, high blood pressure, and raised cholesterol and triglycerides, There are several factors as to why the ketogenic diet aids weight reduction:

Fat has a greater satiety effect than carbs.
The appetite suppressing effect of the products produced by the diet mechanism in the body.
Reduction of the fat-making process and triggering of fat breakdown.
In glucose deficiency, the body has a higher energy load to produce energy from fats.
It can be thought of as the high thermic effect of proteins.

Some researchers argue that the ketogenic diet, together with proteins, reduces appetite and affects hormones. Meanwhile, others claim that ketone bodies themselves have direct appetite-reducing effects, and beta-hydroxybutyrate has a stimulating effect on energy satiety signals and central satiety signals.

High-Fat Dieters Lose More Weight Than Low-Fat Dieters:

There are several scientific studies that indicate the effectiveness of keto for weight loss over other kinds of diet. Here’s a sample:

One 12-week research published in the journal Lipids discovered that ketogenic dieters lost nearly twice as much weight as a low-fat diet group, although having the same calorie consumption.
Surprisingly, ketogenic diets frequently induce weight loss even when calories are not restricted. A study published in the New England Journal of Medicine permitted a ketogenic group to eat as much protein and fat as they wanted, while low-fat dieters had to limit their calories. The low-carb eaters lost considerably more weight after six months, and somewhat more after a year.

If this makes you wonder about the adage that “a calorie is a calorie”, and that the total quantity of calories you consume influences whether you gain or lose weight, you’re not alone.

A Nutrition & Metabolism research had people follow either a ketogenic diet or a low-fat diet for the same period before switching diets (50 days for the men in the study; 30 days for the women).

In each case, the individuals attempted to eliminate 500 calories from their previous diet, but the keto method resulted in the guys consuming much more. Nonetheless, limiting carbohydrates performed better for both men and women in terms of fat loss. More impressive still is the fact that the men lost three times as much fat directly from around their waists as they did on a low-fat diet.

A meta-analysis of 13 randomized controlled trials followed overweight and obese participants for 1-2 years on either low-fat diets or very-low-carbohydrate ketogenic diets. The analysis discovered that the ketogenic diet resulted in a small but significant greater reduction in weight, triglycerides, and blood pressure, as well as a greater increase in HDL and LDL cholesterol, compared to the low-fat diet at one year.
A study of 39 obese people who followed a ketogenic, low-calorie diet for 8 weeks discovered a mean weight loss of 13% and substantial decreases in fat mass, insulin levels, blood pressure, and waist and hip circumferences. Their ghrelin levels did not rise when they were in ketosis, which contributed to their reduced hunger.

To summarise, results are important, but no diet will work long-term if it makes you unhappy. You’ll give up, revert to your previous eating habits, and gain weight. However, here is where a ketogenic or Mod Keto diet truly shines. Fats and proteins are extremely satiating. Eating them keeps you fuller, so you’re less likely to feel “starving” — even if your calories are low — and break your diet to binge.

Research on overweight women published in the Journal of the American Dietetic Association discovered that not only did they lose more weight on keto than they did on a higher-carb, lower-fat diet, but they also reported feeling less hungry during the diet.

References:

https://www.academia.edu/2411016/Perceived_Hunger_Is_Lower_and_Weight_Loss_Is_Greater_in_Overweight_Premenopausal_Women_Consuming_a_Low-Carbohydrate_High-Protein_vs_High-Carbohydrate_Low-Fat_Diet
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/23801097/
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/24557522/
https://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.511.2285&rep=rep1&type=pdf
https://nutritionandmetabolism.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s12986-017-0175-5
https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/11/2/2092

Maria Mona

Maria Khatun Mona is a Founder and Editor of Nursing Exercise Blog. She is a Nursing and Midwifery Expert. Currently she is working as a Registered Nurse at Evercare Hospital, Dhaka, Bangladesh. She has great passion in writing different articles on Nursing and Midwifery. Mail her at “maria.mona023@gmail.com”