Do Diets With Ready Made Foods Like Medifast Really Work?

There’s no question that prepackaged diets are popular because of their convenience and ease of use.  For people who don’t like having to count calories, or plan and prepare their own meals, prepackaged diets seem like a much easier option. You basically just chose which foods you might enjoy and that’s all the heavy lifting you really have to do.  But do these type of diets work?  Are they effective?  Because what good is an easy diet when if it doesn’t help you to lose weight? In the following article, I’ll look some clinical studies that might shed some light on whether prepackaged diets work and are effective.

Some Medifast Studies Which Gage This Ready Made Diet’s Effectiveness: Medifast is one of the more popular and well known prepackaged diets.  There have been a few studies that have looked at the effectiveness of this diet. Probably the most well known studies were conducted at John Hopkins University. 

One study  looked at dieters with diabetes on Medifast versus those on the American Diabetes Association diet.  The folks on the prepackaged diet lost twice as much weight than the those on the ADA diet and stuck with their diet plan for twice as long.

Another study at John Hopkins followed both men and women who used Medifast for about four months. The men lost on average of 67 pounds and women lost an average of 47 pounds over 16 weeks.  Both studies would appear to show that the program was affective for many of the folks participating in the clinical studies.

Are Ready Made Diets Like Medifast Effective In Real Life?: Clinical studies are one thing, real life is another.  I’ve had readers tell me that the folks in the clinical studies knew that their progress was being tracked so it’s possible that they were being extra diligent.  I suppose this is possible. But, you can also look at the experiences and results of regular people on the diet whose results weren’t being watched or tracked.

I’ve been very happy with my results and I know plenty of people who feel the same way.  That’s not to say that every week has been easy or that the weight loss was constant.  There were down days and weeks.  And it’s my experience that you have to mostly follow along and stick to the plan, at least for the most part.  But overall, many of us have believe the these type of diets work better for us than past diets that have required more work.

Every one has different preferences and personalities. Some people like planning and food preparation. I don’t.  I don’t have the time for it and I don’t enjoy it.  So, this prepackaged plan has been a good fit for me.  Which leads me to my next point.  I believe that a diet’s effectiveness is going to partly depend on how good the diet you chose fits with your personal preferences and life style. Only you can decide if a prepackaged diet will be a good fit for you.

Lindsey’s Medifast Review Website features recipes, a list of all of the foods (including the shakes,) videos, tips, coupons ($ 50 off or two weeks free), information and products related to success on this diet. She also offers a free ebook (“Getting The Most Out Of Medifast”) to help you get started. You can visit her at http://easiest-diet.com/

Lindsey Price often writes about medifast and has published a free medifast ebook called “Getting The Most Out Of Medifast”.  You can get a free copy at http://easiest-diet.com/

Which Weight Loss Plans Really Work?

According to the Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report (MMWR), nearly 25.6% of the US population was found to be obese in 2007 and so, which extreme weight loss plans really work, is a rather relevant question.

While there are numerous methods, from surgery to diets, medication to rigorous gym workouts, to lose weight, it may not be a good idea to experiment on your own. So get some medical supervision while you work out a weight loss plan for you.

Liposuction and bariatric surgery
One of the commonly used extreme weight loss methods is Liposuction. An essentially surgical technique, the procedure involves inserting a probing device into the patient’s body and liquefying the fat before suctioning it out. The procedure seems relatively simple but it does not come not without its pain.

Another surgical procedure is Bariatric surgery. This is a method which is adopted when all others fail. In Bariatric surgery the stomach is stapled and part of the intestine removed so that the person is forced to reduce the amount of food they consume. However the reduced intake of calories puts the person in constant danger of malnutrition.

Apart from surgery
Moving away from surgical procedures, another option for extreme weight loss is water fasting, and helps the person lose weight rapidly in the first days but then the rate gets slower. However, if you practice weight loss for more than a couple of days you will notice muscle fatigue and a drastic drop in energy levels.

Diet pills are probably the most common method of achieving immediate weight loss. They work by reducing appetite but as usual come not without their side effects. Not surprisingly, most of these diet pills are veiled amphetamines in prescription form and have the potential to be addictive with numerous other side effects.

Extreme diet is yet another trick for rapid weight loss. It involves eating only raw vegetables, cutting out all carbs, restricting yourself to a meal a day and absolutely no fat or sugar. An extreme diet drastically cuts down on calories and thus causes the weight loss. However this diet can leave you fatigued and listless.

More effective ways
While all these methods put grave stress on your body and have only short term benefits, there are other more effective ways to shed weight, albeit slowly. To begin with exercise for at least 40-60 minutes a day. Replace all the fats with fibers, fruits and vegetables and control your helping, making them small.

Drink lots of water, it helps lose weight and is good for your health. Drink water even before you feel thirsty and avoid drinking sodas, they contain artificial sugar that causes you to accumulate useless calories.

To efficiently burn fat your body requires at least 8 hours of sleep a night; additionally, sleeping right will give you more energy and help you focus during the day. So don’t hesitate to sleep off the fat!

All things said and done, sitting before the computer reading this article is all theory, now head of to that treadmill and be firm with yourself, this can save you thousands of dollars and needless days of pain.

Julia is a skin specialist. Her interests vary from food, diet to skin care and anti aging related treatments. Here are her articles on skin care health, specifically anti aging skin care and other cosmetic treatments.

Medifast Diets – Diet plans that really work

There are literally hundreds of diet plans to choose from if you want to lose weight. Some work for you while many probably not. It ‘very important to choose the plan that suits you. Many people fail because they are dieting, you lose weight overnight, but as one that fits your lifestyle choice promises.

Moderator: The most important thing is not to deprive your favorite dishes. The key to alleat what you want, but do so in moderation. If you love a certain food, buy the smallest size of available packages, the way, if you dive, eat as much as you may have. Allow only a limited number of foods high in fat at home. If these foods are not readily available, are more likely to consume in moderation. Completely devoid of food you can love, desire, and ultimately lead to failure of the diet.

Carbohydrate count: Everyoneoccurs, the low carb and no carb diets. These plans require that you limit the amount of carbohydrates consumed over a long period of time. Low-carb or not to help these diets to lose weight fast, but be careful when introducing foods that are high in carbohydrates in the diet. Back to the introduction of a lot of carbohydrates in the diet too quickly can lead to an increase weight. Remember, if you love someone, pasta, potatoes and bread, this is probably not the right concept for you.

Meals onMail: There are many diets, the food will be delivered directly to your home. This is not only a good way to get food, can not be for everyone. These diets can be good for a person on the street and have time for a healthy meal to cook worried. Cars offer more-help, build, and maintain your diet on track. Although these systems can operate, it can be very expensive.

Weight Watchers is one of those occasions. Pleasecertain group of favorite foods, this may be the perfect solution for you. This system is based on a scale basis. Every food has a certain threshold. These points are taken during the day, without exceeding the maximum number of points per day. Not only that you can eat what you want in moderation meetings, every week there are also many towns and villages for their support. If you can not attend a weekly meeting, no problem, even remote support. This system teaches you to eatModeration and madness is right from time to time. In fact, sports are the rules! This plan, along with daily exercise, diet can be a very good, which can operate long term with little effort.

These are just some examples of the many diets available. As you heard earlier in May, is very important, a diet that is compatible with your particular lifestyle to choose. Remember, food should not be treated as a fad or a quick fix.Diets and weight loss should be considered, a change that lasts a lifetime.

http://www.medifastdiets.pannipa.com/2009/11/21/diet-plans-that-really-work/

About Author Snow Shovels

Do Diet Plans & Diet Menus Really Work?

The answer to this question is not always clear.

Some diet plans and menus will work real well for some people, but this doesn’t necessarily mean, however, that they will work well for everyone. The key thing to think about here is really the principles that the diet plan is based on and how long you can stick with the program!

Diet plans & pre-organized menus can be really helpful from two main aspects. Firstly, they can take away a lot of the stress associated with choosing and planning the food you are going to eat. Follow the plan and it is all there for you. Secondly they can be really helpful getting the actual weight loss you want, because the diet plan has hopefully been carefully looked into and developed with a person’s nutritional needs taken into account. So it could actually be healthy as well.

Both of these help to eliminate some of the problems associated with diets…the choice of what to eat and when to eat it, and in what combinations…so we stay healthy through the dieting process. We need to not only stick with a certain number of calories per day, we also need to make sure that we get the right balance of protein, carbohydrates, fat, minerals etc.

Let’s say you try out a low carb or low fat diet plan with a good reputation. Your diet plan tells you exactly what you should and shouldn’t be eating and it may even have a specific menu that you can follow if you like. Dieting solutions that are well thought out and that have a solid basis of healthy rather than fad eating can be really successful.

But, things might look pretty different if the diet plans or diet menu you look at are based on shakier foundations. Let’s say that as an alternative you decide to try out some new, never-been-tried-before high protein diet shakes and you use the shakes as a replacement to one or more meals a day. This can be a great way of losing a few pounds over a few weeks but can you eat like this forever? Chances are you can’t and as soon as you stop mixing up the shakes and start eating a regular diet again the pounds will start creeping back on. It may well only be a temporary solution.

One of the drawbacks of some diet plans is that food or meal list only covers a short-time period, say two weeks, so it can also be darn hard to stick with repeating the same food day in day out for weeks and then maybe months on end. Let’s face it, a few weeks of sticking to any boring and repetitive diet plan will drive most of us crazy and craving any food but diet food.

So look for diet plans with a good balance of food types, lots of variation, demonstrated success and a great reputation.

If you want some helpful suggestions then take a look at some of the solutions suggested at http://www.YouCanLoseWeightToday.com. The ideas presented there might just help get your body working to lose weight fast for you and lessen your cravings during the process!
H Woolston

Q&A: I have a really fat cat and he hates diet food, what should i do to make him like it?

Question by kym :]: I have a really fat cat and he hates diet food, what should i do to make him like it?
He’s an orange tabby and the sweetest cat ever! Also when we got him the diet food, he threw a fit and ran away for 1 whole day!

Best answer:

Answer by running with scissors
put half his normal food and half diet food then gradually put more diet food then his normal cat food

Add your own answer in the comments!