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Dairy augmentation of weight and fat loss

International Journal of Obesity volume 29, pages 1393–1394 (2005)Cite this article

In his letter, Kalman1 has raised some interesting points in response to our recent publication of yogurt augmenting total and central fat loss secondary to energy. However, the concern regarding compliance as a confounding variable appears to be unfounded. As indicated in the article, ‘all subjects maintained complete diet diaries, and compliance was assessed by weekly subject interview and review of the diet diary and product return (analogous to pill counts)’. To expand upon this, subjects were judged to be compliant only if their diet diaries indicated they maintained a total calcium intake of ≤600 mg/day exclusive of the yogurt or gelatin desert, consumed 80–100% of the product provided (based on product return) and maintained an energy intake within 200 kcal of the daily energy prescription. Using these criteria, 13 of the 18 subjects on the yogurt diet and 10 of the 16 subjects on the control diet met all criteria for compliance. Separate analysis of the compliant subjects yielded comparable data to that found in the analysis of all subjects completing the trial, although the statistical significance achieved was stronger in the compliant group.

With regard to the macronutrient, calcium and energy intakes achieved, this data is indeed provided in this paper and summarized in Table 2. However, to reiterate this data, subjects in both groups achieved a diet that contained 30% of energy from fat, 18% from protein and 52% from carbohydrate. The actual calcium intakes achieved (also shown in Table 2) were 495±28 mg/day for the control group and 1077±22 mg/day for the yogurt group, and the actual energy intake achieved was 1303 and 1437 kcal/day for the control and yogurt groups, respectively. Thus, the targeted calcium intakes were achieved, and the study was not confounded by an altered macronutrient pattern.

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References

  1. Zemel MB, Richards J, Mathis S, Milstead A, Gebhardt L, Silva E . Dairy augmentation of total and central fat loss in obese subjects. Int J Obes Relat Metab Disord 2005; 29: 391–397.

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  2. Bowen J, Noakes M, Clifton PM . Effect of dairy foods in high protein, energy-restricted diets on weight loss and metabolic parameters in overweight adults. Int J Obes Relat Metab 15 February 2005 advance online publication; doi:10.1038/sj.ijo.0802895.

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  3. Zemel MB, Thompson WQ, Milstead A, Morris K, Campbell P . Calcium and dairy acceleration of weight and fat loss during energy restriction in obese adults. Obes Res 2004; 12: 582–590.

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  1. Department of Nutrition, The University of Tennessee, Knoxville, TN, USA

    M B Zemel

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  1. M B Zemel
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Zemel, M. Dairy augmentation of weight and fat loss. Int J Obes 29, 1393–1394 (2005). https://doi.org/10.1038/sj.ijo.0803058

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