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There’s no magical way to lose weight
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I found out from a blogger friend of mine that there is a new fad diet called Sensa that involves sprinkling so-called ‘tastants’ on your food. They are supposed to make the food taste and smell better and then result in you eating less.
It sounds to me just like another scam to make money off of people desperate to lose weight – the 6-Month Starter Kit costs $210!
Is it magic?
They claim that you can eat whatever you want and don’t need to change anything with your eating or exercise habits. They even say on their site: “There are no food restrictions, and no change in lifestyle. … And you can continue to eat all your favorite foods!“.
That alone – even if some people do lose weight with it – should sound some alarms. Eating healthy foods and exercising isn’t just for losing weight. The nutrients found in foods like fruits, vegetables and whole grains are needed for us to stay healthy. Cardiovascular exercise helps us to keep our hearts strong and strength training helps us to maintain muscle mass and to strengthen our bones.
Peer review?
Additionally, I don’t see any mention of the research for this product being published in a peer-reviewed journal, only a very brief summary of a clinical trial. No details of the methodology are included. It is only mentioned that the control group “was given a placebo — crystals that looked like Sensa Tastants, but unlike Tastants, did not enhance smell or taste”. If the ‘placebo’ tastants had no taste or smell, then obviously everyone in the study knew if they were in the test or the control group which could of course skew the results.
What’s in it?
According to the site the ingredients of the tastants are:
1. Maltodextrin (a thickening agent and sweetener)
2. Tricalcium Phosphate (an anti-caking agent)
3. Silica (inert, as far as I can tell)
4. Natural and Artificial Flavors
5. FD&C Yellow 5
6. Carmine
7. Contains Soy and Milk ingredients
Apparently nothing in them needed FDA approval and seem only to do what they claim – add flavor and smell to the food.
Evidence based science?
The guy who is selling this stuff (Alan Hirsch) founded and is the director of the ‘Smell & Taste Treatment and Research Foundation‘ which I believe conducted the ‘research’. I don’t have any other information about this foundation to be able to evaluate the scientific legitimacy of the foundation or its research.
Worth mentioning also – <sarcasm> his research must be legitimate since he was interviewed by the ‘Prestigious’ medical journal ‘Alternative & Complementary Therapies’</sarcasm>, as it stated on his foundation’s site.
Smell and appetite
On a personal note – the basic idea of sensa is that if you make food taste and smell better, people will feel full faster and eat less. I have never had a good sense of smell and have alway been pretty skinny. I attribute part of my thinness to my inability to smell. If your sense of smell is strong it seems to me that the smell of good food increases a person’s appetite, while for me – I can hardly smell food and so I don’t get hungry when I’m near it.
Around the blogosphere
Other bloggers who have already written about this include JoLynn Braley and Mike Howard. I would love to hear what medical bloggers like Dr. Val and science bloggers like Orac and those at Denialism would say about sensa, as they have written about weight management and obesity issues.
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May 15, 2008
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Eating healthy to stay healthy
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Today’s topic for National Women’s Health Week is eating healthy. Eating right can help you stay healthy for a long time.
So how do you eat healthy?
Michael Pollan sums it up pretty well:
Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants.
Eating more fresh fruits and vegetables is a great way to start eating better. They not only have lots of fiber and vitamins but also phytochemicals and possibly many other things in them that have not even been discovered yet that can help us stay healthy.
Canned vegetables tend to have lots of salt added to them and canned fruit, a lot of sugar. Frozen is ok, but fresh is probably the best. Try to avoid boiling vegetables as the vitamins can be lost that way. Steaming is great way to prepare many different vegetables.
Nuts and seeds are also very good choices. Try to find some that are not salted. Its not always easy to find them so I tend to buy the nuts sold for baking. Unsalted sunflower and pumpkin seeds are even more difficult to find, but some health food stores may have them.
The other type of plant food is grains. Good choices are whole grain bread and pasta. And brown or wild rice instead of white. In the winter I eat hot cereal for breakfast – either oats or millet. In the summer I eat the Kashi puffed grains which has no sugar or salt added to it.
Most groups of people who tend to live a long time tend to eat very little if any meat. Not eating as much meat can help the environment too – lots of food has to be grown to feed farm animals, which could instead feed people.
Lots of research continues to show that overeating and obesity can lead to a number of health problems including diabetes and heart disease. Its also best to reduce the amount of salty and sugary foods eaten.
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April 2, 2007
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Do we really want to be healthy?
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I’ve been writing a lot lately about eating healthy foods and want to share some of the posts I’ve found recently.
A recent Johns Hopkins study suggests that some people may not eat right because they feel they can’t afford to buy nutritious foods. At MyDocHub Blog Priscilla has a great post about how to “Eat Healthy Without Breaking The Bank” where she discusses several strategies to eat healthy without over spending.
And Sarah White at CalorieLab Calorie Counter News mentions a new study showing that advertisers are targetting junk food ads to kids. “In a typical day, kids see five ads for candy and snacks, four each for fast foods and soft drinks, three for cereal and two for restaurants”. Adults seem to have enough difficulty as it is eating right – how are kids who are constantly having junk foods shown to them going to be able to eat right as adults?
Dr. Charles of The Examining Room of Dr. Charles in “How to Lose Weight and Eat Healthy… Seriously” recommended an article in the New York Times Sunday Magazine recently as a good starting point for those wanting to lose weight. He quotes the article: “Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants.”.
That sums it up pretty good – but why can’t we seem to do it?
And its not just avoiding illness that is at stake – there is more evidence all the time that calorie restriction can slow down the aging process.
I can’t help but think that all the advertising to adults and kids of unhealthy foods plays a large role in overeating.
But which came first? A nearly uncontrollable desire to eat fatty, salty, sweet foods or the producers of these foods marketing them to us – and making us think we want them even more?
Clearly the genes to make us keep eating were in place first – but will our desire to live a long, healthy life be able to overcome the junk food marketers?
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Related Posts:
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- Kids need all the nutrition help they can get!
- There’s no magical way to lose weight
March 27, 2007
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Why people don’t eat better
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In my last post I asked:
So why don’t more people eat better? I would love to know a way to do a real survey and find out the causes – what percent of people don’t know any better, which don’t care, can’t afford to eat better, how many are too stressed and busy to take the time, etc.
Then yesterday I saw this press release from Johns Hopkins: “Johns Hopkins researchers examine why people eat the foods they do“.
Their study assessed the dietary choices of 4,356 U.S. adults from 20 to 65 years old. They found that ethnic, gender and income levels played a big role in the choices people made. I didn’t see a mention of the role of that education levels might play or how a busier, more stress filled life may influence what people eat.
The socio-economic status and income levels of those surveyed were taken into account though. I would guess that both of these tend to correlate with education levels – leading to a lot of people not eating right because they honestly don’t know any better.
It seems likely that stress and a busy lifestyle play a part also. I’m sure there are many people out there with very little time who eat fast food – because it is fast. Working long hours, running around here and there taking care of errands and doing stuff with kids makes it very difficult for many to be at home and cook regular meals.
And for myself – whenever I feel a bit stressed I tend to grab the most saltiest, fattiest*, sugary foods I can find around the house, regardless of how much good nutritious food we have.
Its not easy to eat right with when we are constantly surrounded by food that is not good for us to eat – but tastes good. Between advertising, people around us eating badly and all the junk in grocery stores sitting real close to the good stuff – its a wonder anyone eats well.
I would still love to get more data on why people eat what they do – especially the roles that knowledge of nutrition, general education levels and stress play. With more information it would be easier to identify the groups that need the most help and then find ways to make eating right easier for them.
(* “saltiest, fattiest” – are those real words? I don’t know, but I like them – them seem to make the point better.)
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- Eating healthy to stay healthy
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March 23, 2007
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Nutrition and cancer
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Lots of news stories this week about diet and cancer prevention as well the prevention of diabetes.
First, in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute, there is a paper presenting evidence that postmenopausal women who eat a diet high in plants, especially those rich in lignans have a lower chance of developing hormone receptor positive breast cancers. Lignan is a type of phytochemical found in many plant foods such as seeds, whole grains, fruits and vegetables. Specifically in this study it was found that in over 50,000 postmenopausal French women whose diet had the highest amount of lignans had a 17% lower chance of developing breast cancer.
Another paper in the same journal shows that postmenopausal women eating a high-fat diet have an increased risk of developing invasive breast cancer. Diet information was collected in over 150,000 women and it was found that those who got 40% of their calories from fat had a 15 to 32% greater chance of getting breast cancer compared to those with only 20% of their calories coming from fat.
The International Journal of Cancer reports that women in their study who got most of their fat and protein calories from animal products, rather than plants, had a greater chance of getting endometrial cancer. And in the Journal of Nutrition researchers show that people who eat a lot of fruit and little meat have a much lower chance of having polyps which could develop into colon cancer. Out of 700 something people studied those who ate lots of meat were 70 percent more likely to have had a polyp.
And far as type 2 diabetes goes, in the American Journal of Epidemiology there is a paper by Allison Hodge of the University of Melbourne, Australia showing that people who eat more salad and cooked vegetables and less meat and other fatty foods have a much lower chance of developing the disease. Other recent research (American Journal of Public Health) shows a positive correlation between diets high in soft drinks and a risk for diabetes.
All this right after a report from the CDC indicating that most Americans are not eating anywhere near enough fruits and vegetables, putting them at a much greater risk of heart disease, cancer, etc. Apparently only a third of Americans eat anywhere near the recommended amounts.
Of course, most all of this data is derived from self-reports of what people eat which is unlikely to be completely accurate. Nevertheless it seems there is more than enough data pointing in the direction that more fruit and vegetables and less fat in the diet helps people stay healthier.
So why don’t more people eat better? I would love to know a way to do a real survey and find out the causes – what percent of people don’t know any better, which don’t care, can’t afford to eat better, how many are too stressed and busy to take the time, etc. Any one know how to have a scientifically accurate survey done? I’m guessing it would be too expensive for most people, like myself, to do it though.
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