Do Diets Really Work? The Trick Is Sticking To It, New Study Reveals

Just if and how much weight an individual will or could lose is influenced by a number of factors. For instance, genetics and environmental components will play a role somewhere in the mix. A crash diet might also not be of much help for long-term weight-loss goals.

However, tried and true efforts prove successful if they're simply followed, according to recent findings. Researchers found that a little patience and practice could be all it takes to shed the pounds.

"We wanted to be the first to compare, in an evidence-based fashion, all existing randomized trials of branded diets to determine their effectiveness with regard to weight loss," said lead study author Bradley Johnston, an assistant professor of clinical epidemiology of the Michael G. DeGroote School of Medicine at McMaster University and clinical epidemiologist and scientist at The Hospital for Sick Children (SickKids), in a news release. 

For the study, researchers conducted a meta-analysis on 48 randomized clinical trails that used various branded diets, including Jenny Craig, Zone, Weight Watchers, Nutrisystem, etc., totaling over 7,200 adults who were overweight or obese, at a median of age 46. Weight-loss progress was then assessed at six months and then again at 12 months.

Findings revealed that participants who were on a low-carbohydrate diet lost 19 pounds more than those who were not on diets, while those on low fat diets lost 17 pounds more those who were not dieting by the 12-month-mark.

Furthermore, researchers also found that dieting that added on behavioral counseling boosted weight loss about an average of seven pounds at the six-month-mark.

Furture studies could help better assess the long-term effects of diet and weight loss. For now, the simply method of "sticking it out" may be the trick to slimming the waistline. 

More information regarding the findings can be seen via the Journal of the American Medical Assocaition (JAMA).