Calcium and Weight Loss

by Nutrition Focus

A new study finds that people consuming more calcium, and in particular calcium from dairy foods, lose more weight and fat than others eating the same calories. Forty-one obese subjects were put on diets designed to cause a loss of one pound per week for 24 weeks; 32 completed the study. The diets were low (430 mg) calcium, the same diet with supplements to bring calcium to 1200 mg, and a diet with enough dairy to provide about 1100 mg calcium.

The low calcium group lost almost 15 pounds (6.6 kg), the high calcium group 19 pounds (8.6 kg), and the high dairy group 24 pounds (11.1 kg). Similar losses of body fat and fat around the abdomen were noted. All these differences were statistically significant. The research appeared in the April 2004 issue of Obesity Research.

www.obesityresearch.org/cgi/content/abstract/12/4/582

HERE'S WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW:

This study follows several observations that people consuming more milk or yogurt weighed less and had less body fat. The present study shows that a high-calcium, dairy-rich diet contributes to greater weight loss than does a simple reduction in calories. This was a relatively small, short term study, so it needs to be replicated. Since most of us don't get enough calcium in our diets, you now have another reason to do so.

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