Women’s Lecture Series to Address Popular Diets

The Benefits and Risks of Popular Diets Wednesday, February 15 6:30–8:00 p.m. MMS Headquarters Speaker: Caroline Apovian, M.D., associate professor of medicine at Boston University School of Medicine and director of the Nutrition and Weight Management Center at Boston Medical Center CME Credit: 1.5 category 1 credits (RM) To register, call (800) 843-6356.

Of the many Americans dieting today, most are women. In addition, the majority of those dieters are trying to lose weight without a physician’s or dietitian’s supervision. Instead, they’re relying on popular diet books and other merchandise.

The next program in the Committee on Women in Medicine Lecture Series will address the benefits and risks of popular diet fads (see box, right). The program will include a discussion of some of the most well-known diets, including the Atkins diet, Sugar Busters, the South Beach diet, and the Ornish diet.

The past popularity of the Atkins diet prompted several investigations into the effects of low-carbohydrate, Atkins-like diets on body weight and other health parameters. This educational program will focus on those studies and help attendees understand the similarities and differences between many of the popular low-carb/high-fat and high-carb/low-fat diets.

This program will discuss which approaches are best for weight loss and weight maintenance, based on both epidemiological data and results from the Weight Loss Registry, a database of several thousand people who have lost at least 50 pounds and have kept it off for at least three years.

– Caroline M. Apovian, M.D.