The Mediterranean diet might get all the attention as the go-to for flexible dieters who are looking to lose weight.
But a new diet promises to help you lose weight by focusing on just two nutrients – fiber and protein.
Known as iDip – or by its less punchy name, the Individualized Diet Improvement Program – it helped almost half of participants shed 13 percent of their body weight in a new study, or up to 26 pounds.
Even better, they maintained that weight loss for a year after the trial.
The Individualized Diet Improvement Program (iDip), created by researchers at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, emphasized for its users to
Just slashing your calories alone won’t work, it leaves you starved of key nutrients and more likely to binge on foods and regain the weight, the study authors said.
The amount of protein and fiber each person ate depended on their body weight and goals, but generally, saw them eating more fresh vegetables, oats and lean meats like fish and turkey.
Protein is the macronutrient that keeps you full for the longest – even more than fat and carbohydrates. The longer you stay full after a meal, generally, the less you eat overall.
Fiber is a nutrient that is crucial to adding bulk to your diet without adding excess calories- and its found in abundance in fruits and vegetables that also provide the body with vitamins essential to health. It can help you feel full for longer, similar to protein.
‘We’re not excluding food groups as low-carbohydrate or low-fat plans do. The primary goal is to empower dieters to make informed choices so they can create their own sustainable weight-management program,’ Mindy H Lee, a registered dietitian at the University of Illinois said.
The first test of iDip, which took place in 2017, helped half of the participants reach and maintain their weight loss goals.
The second iDip trial, which was just published in the journal journal Obesity Science and Practice, included 22 overweight people and had them attend 19 different workshops, do homework, take weekly body measurements and attend individual counseling over a one year period.
The researchers stayed in contact with the participants for a year after the initial experiments to see if they maintained weight loss.
They were advised to eat high fiber low calorie foods, like oats, apples, beets and broccoli. And they were advise to eat low calorie high protein foods like turkey, chicken, fish and beans.
They did this by giving participants something they called the protein-fiber plot, a tool which allowed them to pick foods that hit their fiber and protein goals.
This is because they say that focusing only on reducing calorie intake without increasing protein and fiber wouldn’t create a sustainable change, lead author Manabu Nakamura, a professor of nutrition, said.
At the end of the trial, 41 percent had achieved significant weight loss, losing 12.9 percent of their initial body mass on average.
For example, someone who weighed 200 pounds was able to lose 26 pounds and keep that weight off in the year after the initial experiment.
However, the program wasn’t a miracle for everyone. The rest of the group, which was about 13 people, averaged weight loss of just 2 percent.
An example of the tool that the researchers gave the participants in order to track the protein and fiber density in their foods
Those who saw results within the first three months were more likely to have sustained weight loss at the end of the trial.
The range in weight loss success showed that the researchers still have some tweaking to do to make it applicable for everyone, the study said.
Also, their study was relatively small, and they need to replicate it with more people in order to determine if it will work on a bigger scale.
iDip shares similarities to other diet trends, like the Mediterranean diet, which has its users eat more fresh food an lean meat, but doesn’t ban any one type of food in particular.
However, it combines these flexible aspects with a rigorous weighing and education system, so that its users can still get a tangible idea of where they’re at with weight loss.
‘The problem with currently available commercial weight-loss programs and products is that the magnitude of dieters’ weight loss is not great,’ Professor Nakamura said.
‘The more serious problem is that people can’t maintain it.’
He added: ‘Flexibility and personalization are key in creating programs that optimize dieters’ success at losing weight and keeping it off.’
