Doctors Blame Atkins Diet for Woman's Life-Threatening State
Posted on: Friday, 17 March 2006, 09:00 CST
People who strictly follow the Atkins diet could be risking their lives. Doctors in New York described how they treated a 40-year-old woman who developed a dangerous condition called ketoacidosis after cutting out carbohydrates.
The obese woman had rigorously followed the diet and taken the recommended precautions, including using vitamins and other supplements marketed by Atkins.
After arriving in a distressed state at a hospital emergency department, she was placed in an intensive care unit.
Four days later she was well enough to be discharged.
The doctors, writing in The Lancet medical journal, published today, said that before her admission, the woman had lost appetite and felt nauseous, vomiting four to six times a day.
After becoming increasingly short of breath, she presented at hospital as an emergency.
The woman was in 'moderate distress' with a respiratory rate of 20 to 30 breaths a minute.
Tests confirmed ketoacidosis - a serious condition that occurs when dangerous levels of acids called ketones build up in the blood. Ketones are produced in the liver when insulin levels fall due to starvation or diabetes.
In the case of this patient, doctors concluded that the Atkins diet was chiefly to blame.
Professor Klaus-Dieter Lessnau, who led the team from the New York School of Medicine, wrote, 'Our patient had an underlying ketosis caused by the Atkins diet and developed severe ketoacidosis possibly when her oral intake was compromised from mild pancreatitis or gastroenteritis.
'This problem may become more recognised because this diet is becoming increasingly popular worldwide.'
The Atkins diet claims to produce rapid weight loss by cutting carbohydrates out of the diet.
For a month before she fell ill, the woman had lived on meat, cheese and salads, said the doctors.
She also took supplements recommended by the diet, including Atkins Basic3 multivitamins, Atkins Essential Oils, Atkins Dieters' Advantage - which contains electrolytes - and a 'thermogenic' formula, Atkins Accel.
As instructed in the original Atkins diet book, she monitored her urine twice daily using dipsticks.
During this month-long period, she lost around nine kilograms of weight.
Commenting on the case, Dr Lyn Steffen and Ms Jennifer Nettleton, from the University of Minnesota School of Public Health in Minneapolis, US, delivered a further warning about Atkins and other carb-cutting diets.
'Low carbohydrate diets for weight management are far from healthy, given their association with ketosis, constipation or diarrhoea, halitosis, headache, and general fatigue, to name a few side effects,' they wrote in The Lancet.
'These diets also increase the protein load to the kidneys and alter the acid balance in the body, which can result in loss of minerals from bone stores, thus compromising bone integrity.'
They said 'indisputable safety' was the most important factor when formulating prescriptions for weight loss.
They added, 'Low carbohydrate diets currently fall short of this benchmark.'
Source: Western Mail
Related Articles
- Health-Conscious Web Surfers Turn to Sensational for Latest Diet and Weight Loss Information
- Attitudes to Food Report: Weight and Dieting in the United States
- My Weight Doctor Announces Expansion Plans for 2008
- Doctors to Get 5 Percent Cut in Medicare
- 2nd Annual Diet Convention and Expo for the Diet and Weight Loss Industry to Be Held October 19-20 in Orlando, Florida
- SELF Magazine Launches the SELF Diet Club, an Online Diet Site
- Diet Convention and Expo for the Diet and Weight Loss Industry to Be Held March 1-2 in Miami, Florida
- Inhibition of Hedgehog Signaling Protects Adult Mice From Diet- Induced Weight Gain1
- Study Links High-Carb Diet and Weight Loss
 |
 |
User Comments (0)
RSS Feeds