Monday, January 7, 2013

Desperate to beat the bulge? Why a calorie-counting mobile app could be the recipe for success

  • MyFitnessPal scored the highest in satisfaction levels in a survey of 13 popular weight-loss plans
  • Weight Watchers was the best paid-for plan
  • Survey reveals apps and websites are changing how people diet as progress can be easily tracked

The start of a new year sees millions go on a diet in an attempt to shift their post-Christmas bulge.
But which weight-loss plans actually work? A new survey suggests the most successful dieters reach for their smartphones.
Consumer Reports magazine asked 9,000 of its readers to reveal what commercial and DIY diet plans they had been on and rate how successful they were.
Weighty issue: A survey has revealed which diets promoted the best customer satisfaction
Weighty issue: A survey has revealed which diets promoted the best customer satisfaction
While people lost 'significant' weight on all 13 of the plans in the survey the free mobile app MyFitnessPal got the highest reader score.
The app, allows the user to count the calories they consume during the day using a huge database of foods and recipes. You can roll the counter backwards to take account of exercise.
 

Of the 9 DIY plans, MyFitnessPal received an overall satisfaction score of 83 and top marks for maintenance, calorie awareness, and food variety.
Myfitnesspal
Calorie-counting apps like myfitnesspal provide an easy way for dieters to keep track of their progress
While Weight Watchers is still the people's choice, chosen by four out of 10 Consumer Reports' readers, its scoring on satisfaction was not as impressive as MyFitnessPal, achieving 74 out of 100. However, it did receive the highest score for a commercial diet plan.
'We were fascinated by the results because satisfaction scores did not correlate well with actual weight loss,' said Nancy Metcalf , senior program editor at Consumer Reports, which is a non-profit organisation.

HOW TO DIET SUCCESSFULLY

The Consumer Report survey revealed...
Dieters should keep expectations in check.  Medical consultants say that dieters often overestimate how much weight they can lose
Tracking calories and physical activity helps maintain motivation. This was used by 87% of MyFitnessPal users
Use all the tools available on a plan. Weight Watchers members felt more satisfied and lost more weight if they went to meetings compared to those who followed the diet online
Consumers preferred diets that helped them maintain weight loss and prescribed easy-to-make lifestyle changes
Some diets on the Consumer Reports' list were built around restricting major categories of food, such as Atkins. Of these the Paleo Diet was best-liked
'You can lose on any diet plan if it works for you, but it seems that dieters balance weight loss against other factors such as the extent to which a diet is sustainable or easy to follow.'
In the commercial category, Medifast got the second highest satisfaction score (70), followed by Jenny Craig (66) and Nutrisystem (56).
In terms of initial weight loss, Medifast was the only commercial plan to receive an above average rating. A typical weight loss for men was 20 to 43 pounds while it was 14 to 40 pounds for women.
The Paleo Diet, which instructs dieters to eat like a caveman, came second for DIY diets with an 80 score. This was followed by the Mediterranean Diet (77) and SparkPeople (76) which is an app and website.

The results of the survey reflect the broadening landscape of diets that subscribers reported using.
'The rapid emergence of new apps to help dieters crunch numbers and stay on top of their calories and exercise regimens is clearly having an enormous impact that our new methodology was able to capture,' said Metcalf. 
In 2011, the last time Consumer Reports rated diets, it based the Ratings on the results of clinical trials and a nutritional analysis.
The report, in next month's copy of Consumer Reports, notes that readers gave high marks to the diets that helped them maintain weight loss and that prescribed lifestyle changes that were easy to make.

IF YOU WANT TO LOSE WEIGHT YOUR BETTER TO GO RUNNING THAN USE WEIGHTS

Aerobic exercise is better for weight loss than resistance training such as using weights, a study shows.
The largest trial carried out to compare the two found that aerobic exercise - low intensity workouts which exercise the heart - was more effective than anaerobic, such as short springs and weight training.
It was particularly true where time constraints were an issue, reports the Journal of Applied Physiology.
The authors say ‘it may be time to seriously reconsider the conventional wisdom’ that resistance training, which helps build muscle, is best for weight loss.
The team studied 234 previously sedentary overweight or obese people aged 18-70, who were enrolled in one of three eight-month supervised training programmes: aerobic training (AT), resistance training (RT), or a combination (AT/RT).
Those assigned to aerobic training exercised vigorously, at about 70-85 per cent of maximum heart rate, for 45 minutes three days per week throughout the study period.
Those doing weight training also exercised three days a week, completing three sets of 8-12 reps on eight resistance machines that targeted all major muscle groups. The third group did both sets of exercise.
At the end of the study, the only people who had not lost weight were the resistance trainers, who actually gained weight due to an increase in lean body mass.
Those who did aerobic exercise saw their waist circumference and fat mass significantly decrease.
Lead author Leslie Willis, from North Carolina's Duke University Medical Centre, said: ‘Given our observations, it may be time to seriously reconsider the conventional wisdom that resistance training alone can lead to weight and fat loss.’ 

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