When you talk about weight loss, there can sometimes be a lot of restriction. There is not much talk about adding food to the diet, just taking food away. One recent study looks at older adults and fat loss when eating low-carb and high-fat. The study was published in the August issue of the journal Nutrition and Metabolism and looks at whether a very low carb diet (VLCD) can help older adults lose weight. In a surprising twist, researchers asked participants to add a specific food to their diet.
This food is somewhat synonymous with high cholesterol. The team of scientists at the University of Alabama at Birmingham’s Nutrition Obesity Research Center wanted to test that.
Participants aged 60-75 years with obesity met registered dietitians every week. But they also got 24 eggs and were told to eat three a day. The eight-week study found that those who ate a VLCD plus the three eggs per day lost more weight than those who did not.
“Although eggs were part of this study, we can not conclude that our findings are a result of daily egg use,” says one of the study’s authors, Amy Goss, PhD, RDN, “but I think something we can conclude that whole eggs can be included in the diet in a healthy way without affecting blood cholesterol in older adults. “
Eggs have been a hot topic when discussing health issues because yolks contain cholesterol. If there are high levels of bad LDL cholesterol in the blood, the risk of cardiovascular disease is higher. But, new research says that a diet high in saturated fat is something to avoid – not eggs. This is because eating things like pastries, processed meats, butter, and other foods high in grams of saturated fat tells the liver to make cholesterol, according to Harvard Health. Egg cholesterol is only about 1.5 grams.
The new study also revealed a reduced risk of cardiovascular disease in participants. That does not have to jump over eggs soon!
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