By Catherine Stroh
Dr. Melinda Boyd, Assistant Professor of Nutrition and Public Health at Cedar Crest College, recently served as a contributing author for a newly published Cochrane Review titled, “Intermittent fasting for adults with overweight or obesity.”
Dr. Boyd, along with one other United States-based dietitian researcher, collaborated on this project with a research team based in Argentina.
The team analyzed the results of 22 randomized controlled studies involving 1,995 participants throughout North America, Australia, China, Denmark, Germany, Norway, and Brazil to see if intermittent fasting would make a difference over the course of six months to a year in helping adults who are overweight or obese lose weight more effectively than conventional dieting.
“[We] looked at various forms of intermittent fasting compared with regular dietary guidance for weight loss purposes, and in some cases no dietary advice was provided for the control group,” says Dr. Boyd.
Upon review, the researchers found that intermittent fasting, restricting eating to about eight hours per day, for example, “may make little to no difference to weight loss and quality of life.” When comparing conventional dieting, or no dieting, to intermittent fasting, no clinically meaningful difference was found in weight loss results or quality of life.
“These findings indicate that calories consumed versus expended likely play more of a role than the timing of meals or meal patterns,” says Dr. Boyd.
Dieting and intermittent fasting aside, however, Dr. Boyd emphasizes the importance of quality of life instead, that our relationship with food is just as important as the nutrients we put into our bodies.
“A diet plan to lose weight that doesn’t account for quality of life, meaning you feel miserable on the diet, and in the case of intermittent fasting, may end up missing out on enjoying food in a social environment, may not be the best choice,” says Dr. Boyd.
Regardless of the timing of when we eat, explains Dr. Boyd, the focus should rather be on intake that meets calorie goals while providing adequate nutrients like vitamins, minerals, omega 3 fatty acids, protein, fiber, and other complex carbohydrates, along with avoiding added sugar and excessive intake of saturated fat.
“Based on the findings from our study and my professional experience spanning twenty years as a dietitian, diet quality is more important to health long term, whether we end up consuming those nutrients in a limited eating window (like in intermittent feeding) or spread across the whole day,” says Dr. Boyd.
“Intermittent fasting for adults with overweight or obesity” appears in the Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews, which is recognized as the leading source for systematic reviews in healthcare, utilizing a rigorous method for conducting systematic reviews and an extensive process to ensure high quality research to answer practice-based questions and support evidence-based guidelines.