There are a lot of diets — including some extreme fad diets — that promise to deliver weight loss, but there are a rare few with clinical evidence behind them showing they can help you to keep weight off in the long run.

So it’s not without reason that someone might question whether using Isagenix products can really offer healthy, sustainable weight loss.

Enter Paul Arciero, director of the Human Nutrition and Metabolism Laboratory and professor of health and exercise sciences at Skidmore College in Saratoga Springs, New York, who sought to find out if Isagenix products could be used by men and women for weight loss that could be sustained for over a year.

It was the first study to evaluate the long-term use of Isagenix products. His study design included two phases: a 12-week “weight loss” phase with use of Isagenix products followed by a 52-week “weight maintenance” phase where subjects diverted into two groups who either consumed Isagenix products or returned to a traditional heart-healthy diet (1).

After the subjects lost an average of 10 percent of their total body weight, along with nearly 20 percent body fat and 33 percent visceral fat during the first phase, the subjects who continued to use Isagenix products maintained significantly lower body weight and body fat.

Why Isagenix Works to Keep Weight Off

In the published paper detailing the results of the study, Dr. Arciero and his colleagues wrote that one of the main reasons few people can maintain weight loss in the long-term is “due to lack of adherence.”

The nutrition researchers also suggested that the “quality of the diet is an important feature” of weight maintenance for people who have lost a large amount of weight.

Typical weight regain is thought to be related to something the body goes through called “adaptive thermogenesis” as a result of reduced calorie intake along with changes in appetite. For example, these same processes may have developed in subjects in the study who did regain weight when returning to a normal diet.

The difference with those who kept using Isagenix products was the combination of higher protein intake and distributing greater protein intake over the course of the day to support satiety with use of IsaLean® Shake and IsaLean Bars.

In addition, the participants who kept the weight off successfully incorporated intermittent fasting as one or two Cleanse Days per month. These limited-food days help to reset appetite and offer a person the ability to stay on track with calorie-control goals over time.

Energy, Performance and Healthy Aging

Perhaps a little-recognized aspect of what makes Isagenix sustainable is the clear, continued motivation to set higher goals. Once a weight loss goal is achieved with Isagenix products, the next step up the ladder is a choice of other systems that include Energy, Performance and Healthy Aging solutions.

Exercise in particular can drive greater results from the products. Dr. Arciero continued his research with a set of studies involving athletes, comparing Isagenix products to a performance-focused whole foods meal plan. Both plans used similar nutritional principles of “protein pacing” but the convenience of Isagenix products helped the participants achieve greater adherence and maintain a higher protein intake during their training program. While both groups improved, Dr. Arciero found that athletes (women and men) who received the support of Isagenix products had significantly greater improvements in response to the same exercise program (2, 3).

Both groups of athletes engaged in a multimode training program that included resistance, interval, stretching and endurance training (PRISE). After 12 weeks, the athletes who had the support of Isagenix products during training achieved significantly enhanced muscular power, strength, aerobic performance and flexibility as compared with athletes who consumed fewer grams of protein.

Dr. Arciero noted that while both groups of athletes showed favorable changes in body composition — increased lean body mass and decreased fat mass — the differences in protein intake between the groups had less of an expected effect.

A proposed reason is that the quality of the protein, including whey protein that is rich in the amino acid leucine, works to the advantage of subjects. For example, it may help explain why subjects are able to keep muscle on as they lose weight, protect against changes in metabolism or appetite and even boost athletic performance levels over time while using the products.

Reference

  1. Arciero PJ, Edmonds R, He F, Ward E, Gumpricht E, Mohr A, Ormsbee MJ, Astrup A.  Protein-pacing caloric-restriction enhances body composition similarly in obese men and women during weight Loss and sustains efficacy during long-term weight maintenance. Nutrients 2016, 8(8), 476; doi: 3390/nu8080476
  2. Arciero PJ, Ives SJ, Norton C, Escudero D, Minicucci O, O’Brien G, Paul M, Ormsbee MJ, Miller V, Sheridan C, He F. Protein-pacing and multi-component exercise training improved physical performance outcomes in exercise-trained women: PRISE 3 study. Nutrients2016, 8(6), 332; doi:3390/nu8060332
  3. Ives SJ, Norton C, Miller V, Minicucci O, et al. Multi-modal exercise training and protein-pacing enhances physical performance adaptations independent of growth hormone and BDNF but may be dependent on IGF-1 in exercise-trained men. Growth Horm IGF Res. Oct; 24.  DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ghir.2016.10.002