A low-calorie Mediterranean diet and daily exercises can, if you stick to it, allow significant weight loss, but also maintain it, underlines this analysis of data from the Predimed-Plus trial or program. Moreover, the benefits of adhering to the healthier lifestyle recommended by the Predimed-Plus program seem to be long-lasting. They are still present after one year, according to these conclusions presented in the journal Diabetes Care and could even include a reduction in cardiovascular risks in the longer term.
Overweight or obese patients, especially those with metabolic syndrome, are recommended to lose weight through lifestyle modification. The aim of these recommendations is above all to reduce the cardiovascular risk. However, no study has demonstrated that this beneficial effect can be maintained over the long term: although diets low in fat and carbohydrates have been shown to be effective in losing weight and improving cardiovascular risk, the benefits tend to diminish after a year. This Predimed-Plus program, a "lifestyle" program that combines a low-calorie Mediterranean diet with daily exercise, alone appears to significantly reduce the risk of metabolic disease.
Researchers from the Universitat Rovira i Virgili followed 626 patients aged 55 to 75 with obesity or overweight and metabolic syndrome. They assessed changes in weight, fat accumulation and various cardiovascular risk factors at one year. Analysis shows that mode changes are effective in maintaining clinically meaningful weight loss and at 12 months post-procedure:
- After 1 year of follow-up, 33.7% of patients following a low-calorie Mediterranean diet and practicing daily exercises were able to achieve weight loss of at least 5% of body weight;
- these patients also show improvements in markers related to glucose metabolism and inflammation, unlike patients who did not follow the program;
- participants with diabetes, or at high risk of diabetes, benefit the most from these lifestyle changes, particularly in terms of blood sugar control;
- the greatest weight loss is seen after 12 months, which also shows that it has been maintained over time.
This "PREDIMED-Plus" lifestyle program could also, the researchers suggest, offer the same benefits, or even more, on the cardiovascular level (reduced risk of myocardial infarction, stroke, or death from cardiovascular causes). .
