Exercise better than dieting to trim waistline - article

[LindaT]

I wish someone would inform MY abdominal fat cells of this :p

NEW YORK - Exercise may be especially helpful in reducing the size of fat cells around the waistline — more so than diet alone, a study suggests. That’s important, because fat specifically in the abdomen has been linked to the risk of heart disease and diabetes.

Among a group of obese women who were placed on a regimen of calorie cutting alone or diet plus exercise, those who exercised showed a reduction in the size of fat cells around the abdomen. Women who only dieted showed no such change.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/14376189/

[NotTheCheat]

That's an intersting article, but I don't understand why they didn't do a fourth test group of people who only exercised and didn't change their diet. I would think getting that comparison of the effects of exercise alone would make the study more complete.

[sarahyu]

, but I don't understand why they didn't do a fourth test group of people who only exercised and didn't change their diet.


Probably because it's so hard to get enough people who qualify and are interested in staying the entire 20 weeks with a trial like this. They wanted to do this with as few parameters as possible to be able to do the study with as few test subjects as possible. It's all in the statistics. :dizzy: I volunteer for clinical trials in my area and work in a hospital that predominantly does clinical trials.

Sarah

[Heather]

Sarah makes a great point, but Nancy asks a great question... without the other comparison group, the researchers cannot make any claims about exercise alone. These are exactly the kinds of questions we have to be asking when we read research. All research studies have limits and in order to interpret them we need to understand those limits. For instance, if this study lasted 20 weeks, we can't necessarily extrapolate to results beyond 20 weeks. Also, this study only looked at women and can't generalize to men.

That's not a slam on the research -- as I said, all research studies are limited by the choices researchers have to make about their samples, time frame, comparison group. It's why we need multiple studies to get the full picture.

[madscientist]

I think it's one of those headlines that are a little left of the truth to get your attention. The article ends up reading a bit different than the title suggested. In fact, this seems like a "filler" article. Not much useful information, nothing you haven't already been told, but they needed an article of some kind to fill the quota. :blah:

But on the topic of what the title says, I think exercing without dieting would help you maintain at best. Depending on how much you're exercising, if you can burn off the excess you ate.

But I notice that when I'm exercising and dieting, I lose in my abdomen and upper body first. Then again, I'm 100% pear shaped and have a hard time losing even an inch off my hips or thighs.

[SusanB]

I've heard so many times that good abs are made in the kitchen ... and in my case, it's true. I have muscles under there but the last bits of fat have to go before I get to be slender thru the middle.