The Keto Diet
The keto diet has been a popular dietary trend that has dominated discourse surrounding diet, optimizing health and facilitating weight loss. There are variations to how the keto diet is done, but at its essence it involves restricting carbohydrate consumption and modifying the dietary composition. According to the Food and Nutrition Board of the Institutes of Medicine, the recommend macronutrient distribution range is 45-65% carbohydrate, 10-35% protein and 20-35% fat. In the keto diet, the macronutrient distribution range shifts to 5-10% carbohydrate, 30-35% protein and 55-60% fat. Thus, in the keto diet, fat intake is increased while carbohydrate intake is severely limited to just around 20-50 grams per day. Unlike other diet regimens, any have found the diet to be effective in facilitating weight loss. So how does it work?
How does the Keto diet work?
Carbohydrates are our body’s primary energy source. When we eat pasta, cookies or other carbohydrate-containing foods, glucose and other forms of simple sugars enter our bloodstream. These sugars are taken up by other body’s tissue organs and used for energy production or store as glycogen/fat. After 3-4 hours we enter the fasted (non-fed state), whereby our body starts to break down our liver and muscle glycogen stores for energy. In a prolonged fasting state, our body starts to break down fat in a process called lipolysis. When our body relies on endogenous fat stores for energy, ketone bodies are produced and used as energy sources. The keto diet is named after the ketone bodies which signify that our body is breaking down our body fat for energy. The keto diet mimics the effect of prolonged fasting by requiring us to restrict dietary intake of carbohydrate, thereby depleting our body’s glycogen stores and forcing our body to rely on fat as an alternate energy source.
Health Considerations surrounding the Keto diet
Despite being shown to facilitate short-term weight loss, there are criticisms and long-term health concerns surrounding the keto diet. First and foremost, there hasn’t been many studies which look at the long-term health consequences of adopting a keto diet amongst adults. Thus, the long-term health impact of the keto diet is not well established. Furthermore, many physicians and dietitians are concerned that the imbalanced macronutrient distribution will lead to nutrient deficiencies, low blood pressure, kidney stones, constipation and increased risk of heart disease. Notably, the emphasis of fat intake and low carbohydrate intake has led to inadequate intake of fruits as well as excess consumption of animal fats, and processed foods with poor-quality fats. Consumption of poor-quality foods and inadequate intake of fruits/vegetables is detrimental to one’s health and contradicts well-established and scientifically-supported dietary recommendations for long-term health and wellness. Moreover, many studies have found that many regain weight over the long term (after a year), as the restrictive low-carbohydrate diet becomes difficult to maintain.
Koso Cleanse as a better alternative
Just as with the keto diet, the Japanese 3-Day Koso Cleanse leads to ketogenesis and weight loss if done on regular intervals. If you do fasting for 24H-48H ketogenesis will happen. The 3-Day Koso Cleanse is a better alternative to the keto diet, because it is a more balanced and holistic approach to optimize our health. The juice cleanse promotes the healthy functioning of our body’s internal detoxification pathways. In addition, it emphasizes on the quality of the food that is consumed during the cleanse period, which help to promote a healthy gut microbiota, enhance liver function and detoxification, as well as to reduce inflammation. In fact, there are health benefits entailed with doing the Koso Cleanse as a beginner and as an expert. As a beginner in the cleanse process, one can make beneficial adjustments to your dietary intake pattern by eliminating problematic foods (see previous blog) and drinking KOSO with meals to promote healthy digestion. As one begins to feel acclimated with the cleanse process, and have adapted to eating health-promoting foods, one can eventually benefit from using KOSO to replace meals.