Hello and welcome back to my blog!
Such a fun and controversial topic that I often times see roaming all over social media.
How great would it be if we could just take a pill or have a magic wand to solve all of our health problems, right? Unfortunately, there is no magic wand or a magic detox potion to help you burn more calories than others.
There are soooo many products in the industry that promise wonders when it comes to weight reduction. But as anything else, there needs to be promising research that truly show that a specific product can help induce weight loss.
So, let's get into this topic! In order to understand all of this information, you need to be up to speed in all of the products that fall into this category. Usually, the common supplements that may help in weight loss are:
Hunger suppressors
Supplements that reduce or limit the amount of fat absorbed by your intestine
Increase or accelerate your metabolism (a.k.a calorie burners)
If there are other types of supplements that "help aid in weight reduction" that are not in any of these categories (or contain these ingredients), please leave it on the counter at the store as they probably have ingredients that may not have any kind of research that will ensure safety.
If you read the ingredient list on any of these products you may find that the active components may be:
Caffeine
Green tea extract
Carnitine
Chromium
Conjugated linoleic acid
Fucoxanthin
Garcinia cambogia
Caffeine: From all of these ingredients, caffeine has been studied in a greater extent. It has shown some short-term effects in fat oxidation. It may increase your resting metabolic rate which can lead to utilizing more calories. Although, the possible benefits of caffeine have been extracted mostly as coffee not from supplements as their absorption is different. Further research needs to be done in order to confirm the process in which caffeine could potentially be involved in fat oxidation. Long term effects and benefits need to be identified, if there are some.
Green Tea Extract: same reaction with this product as with caffeine. Tea also contains caffeine, in lower amounts compared to a cup of coffee. Due to the effects of caffeine in green tea, it has the potential to increase slightly the resting metabolic rate. However, it is not completely understood how it can influence in fat oxidation or the effects it may have in a long term consumption. All of the studies do not measure green tea extract consumption on a long term basis.
Carnitine: this is considered a hormone-like substance that it is highly involved in fat metabolism. During rest at night and during a low to moderate workout routines, carnitine (within the muscle) is in charge of transporting chains of fat across the mitochondria so they can go through beta oxidation. However, it is proven that even if you consume more carnitine, it won't increase the beta-oxidation of fat. Muscles have a set amount of a carnitine concentration that should be available to cooperate in beta-oxidation. Adding more, won't change the process.
Chromium: This is a trace element which is considered essential as it does have several functions in the body like: breakdown of carbohydrates and fat and also it is involved in the synthesis of cholesterol (don't be alarmed... I know this may sound bad but it is also needed). For some time, chromium was used to "increase lean body mass" very well known as muscle. However the study that "proved" this benefit did not show a significant difference between the group that had placebo vs the group with the chromium supplement. One of the possible conclusions could be related to an error in measurement as the difference was not significant.
Conjugated Linoleic Acid (CLA): it sounds like such a fancy supplement, but if you are familiar with omega-6 fatty acids, then you know what I am talking about! It is believed that CLA is involved in the fatty acid oxidation, breakdown of fatty tissue and in increasing your resting energy, a.k.a. increasing your metabolism. However, this has been shown in rodent studies. In rodents, the supplementation of CLA has shown benefits in weight reduction and even insulin sensitivity but the important detail here is to notice that out bodies and metabolism work very differently to rodents. In humans, results have been different and inconsistent. This means, that in some small studies there are some slight differences between the placebo group vs the groups supplemented with CLA but in some other studies there was no difference in body composition within the groups. Sooo.. more studies are needed to determine if it is helpful or not.
Fucoxanthin: This is a carotenoid extracted from brown algae. It does have antioxidant
properties and has several positive results in animal studies. To this date, there are not a looot of human studies yet to extract or generalize the results. It was curious that in one of the human studies, the author works for a company that holds patents for this specific product. This can be a conflict of interest between the actual results and the promotion of this supplement. Unfortunately, this happens more often than not. More studies in humans are required to create a recommendation that is focused on weight loss.
Garcinia Cambogia: This is a small fruit with an active ingredient called Hydroxycitric acid. In the past few years this has been widely advertised as a weight loss promoter given that it has fat oxidation and appetite inhibitor properties. However, there is not enough information/studies that prove consistently the effects and there is also no established dose in which these effects are noticeable. More research needs to be done in order to verify this information.
BOTTOM LINE: I am pretty sure that you have seen or heard about these products. However, a lot of these supplements or components have been studied for the most part in animals. That said, a lot of these companies offer weight loss effects while selling their products even if the studies are mostly in animals. The results are very different in animals vs. humans as our bodies do not work the same way (notice the different size in a rodent vs. a human). So, my take home message would be to be careful whenever anyone recommends these supplements because as I mentioned on each paragraph, there is a lack of evidence and part of it are the potential side effects. As I like to mention, the key here is moderation and also a lot of nutrition education. Learning how to balance meals can be a super helpful tool to practice on your daily basis.
You know how to find me if you have more questions or want to work together!
References:
Jeukendrup AE, Randell R. Fat burners: nutrition supplements that increase fat metabolism. Obes Rev. 2011 Oct;12(10):841-51. doi: 10.1111/j.1467-789X.2011.00908.x. PMID: 21951331.
https://health.clevelandclinic.org/do-fat-burners-work/. Accessed on June 15th, 2022.
Zhang H, Tang Y, Zhang Y, Zhang S, Qu J, Wang X, Kong R, Han C, Liu Z. Fucoxanthin: A Promising Medicinal and Nutritional Ingredient. Evid Based Complement Alternat Med. 2015;2015:723515. doi: 10.1155/2015/723515. Epub 2015 May 27. PMID: 26106437; PMCID: PMC4461761.
Semwal RB, Semwal DK, Vermaak I, Viljoen A. A comprehensive scientific overview of Garcinia cambogia. Fitoterapia. 2015 Apr;102:134-48. doi: 10.1016/j.fitote.2015.02.012. Epub 2015 Feb 27. PMID: 25732350
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