Long-Term Study Investigates Keto’s Weight Loss Potential

According to a recent study conducted by a team of Spanish doctors and other researchers, the keto diet may hold the key to sustained weight loss. The research team began their trials in 2014 and have reinitiated it every two years. Their most recent work focused on obesity and the diet’s effect on a person’s resting metabolic rate (RMR). The RMR, which is sometimes referred to as the basal metabolic rate, measures the number of calories a body burns while resting, and is a key indicator in future weight regain.

The Low RMR Lowdown

A number of different factors, including genetics and even weather, can affect a person’s RMR. However, a significant cause of RMR variation is dieting, especially unhealthy crash dieting. That’s because your resting metabolic rate is not only the calories you burn at rest, but is also the lowest amount of energy you need to stay alive.

When you severely restrict your diet, your body goes into survival mode. Without proper fuel, your body will break down your muscle tissue to keep going.1 Your RMR will decrease so that you need less energy to keep going. With decreased muscle and a decreased RMR, weight regain is typical, especially when people go off crash diets.

Keeping the Weight Off

So, as documented in the journal Nutrition & Metabolism 2, the research team set out to evaluate how the RMR would be affected after healthier, keto-induced weight loss. This was actually a follow-up to 2 previous studies they have conducted. In their 2014 research, they determined, like other researchers have, that a low-carb keto diet was superior to a standard low-calorie diet when it comes to weight loss. 2 years later, in 2016, they checked back in with their subjects and found that generally, their subjects had kept off the weight.

The new study then was meant to test their theory that the diet must not affect the RMR in a dramatic fashion. They chose a set of 20 obese patients who followed a similar low-calorie keto diet as the subjects in the first study. These new subjects lost around 45 lbs each over the course of 4 months. What researchers found is that despite the patients’ large weight loss, that weight loss didn’t affect the patients’ RMRs in any significant way. The researchers have concluded that because the study participants didn’t lose a lot of muscle mass, their RMRs stayed steady and so did the weight loss.