Interestingly, the most important factors that influenced the selection of goal weights were appearance and physical comfort rather than change in medical condition or weight suggested by a doctor or health care professional. The proliferation of diet books is nothing short of phenomenal. Dietary claims are scrutinized, diets are analyzed, and information is compared to scientific data published in peer reviewed journals. Evidence is from endpoints of intervention studies that include only a limited number of RCTs, post hoc or subgroup analysis of RCTs, or meta-analysis of RCTs. In general, Category B pertains when few randomized trials exist, they are small in size, and the trial results are somewhat inconsistent.
Evidence is from outcomes of uncontrolled or nonrandomized trials or from observational studies.
Characterization of Diets Diets are characterized below and in Tables 2 and 3 . 20 Table 3. They are naturally high in fiber and low in caloric density. Moderate fat reduction diets contain moderate amounts of carbohydrate and protein. Importantly, moderate-fat reduction diets produce weight loss even when they are consumed ad libitum .