In a new study, researchers found that a low-carb diet may benefit people at risk of developing type 2 diabetes even if they don’t lose any weight.
The research was conducted by a team from Ohio State University.
Metabolic syndrome is a group of conditions that put people at higher risk of type 2 diabetes, heart disease, and stroke.
The conditions include high blood pressure, high blood sugar, excess body fat around the waist and abnormally low ‘good’ HDL cholesterol or high triglyceride levels.
It is estimated that about a third of American adults have the syndrome.
Previous research has shown that low-carb diets can be beneficial for people with metabolic syndrome and diabetes.
But it has been unclear whether that’s a product of the diet or a product of the weight loss typically seen when people reduce carbs.
In the study, the team wanted to know what happens to obese people with metabolic syndrome when they eat a diet low in carbs but don’t lose any weight.
They tested 16 men and women with metabolic syndrome.
They found that after eating the low-carb diet, the participants had a variety of significantly improved health measures, particularly lower triglycerides and improved cholesterol readings.
More than half of them no longer had metabolic syndrome after following a low-carb diet for four weeks.
These people saw their metabolic syndrome reversed even though their diet contained enough calories to keep their weight stable.
The team explains that despite the fact that the low-carb diet contained 2.5 times more saturated fat than the high-carb diet, it could decrease saturated fat in the bloodstream.
This was linked to an increase in the size of cholesterol particles in the blood, which decreases the risk of heart disease and stroke.
The researchers suggest that future long-term diet studies on people with metabolic syndrome need to include low-carb diets.
One author of the study is Jeff Volek, a professor of human sciences at Ohio State.
The study is published in the Journal of Clinical Investigation Insight.
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