TY  - JOUR
AU  - Lane, Jordin
AU  - Fontaine, Kevin
PY  - 2021
DA  - 2021/04/21
TI  - Ketogenic Diet and Health
JO  - OBM Integrative and Complementary Medicine
SP  - 015
VL  - 06
IS  - 02
AB  - Carbohydrate-restricted ketogenic diets (KD) were introduced in the mid-19th century as a weight loss method with a resurgence of its use in epilepsy treatment in the 1920’s. Research conducted over the last several years provides evidence that KD’s can confer beneficial effects for several chronic metabolic diseases, including obesity, type-2 diabetes, and polycystic ovary syndrome. In recent years, emerging evidence suggests KD’s may also have therapeutic benefits for some cancers and for neurological conditions such as Alzheimer's disease, Parkinson's' disease, traumatic brain injury, and spinal cord injury. Finally, as the physiological mechanisms by which a KD operates become increasingly understood, we speculate that several other health conditions (e.g., autism, cystic fibrosis, COVID-19) that may improve from consuming a KD. The potential to reduce or eliminate long-term pharmaceutical treatments and their potential adverse effects by modifying diet patterns justifies additional research, particularly rigorously conducted clinical trials with long-term follow-up. This brief review describes a selection of the recent studies of KD as applied to chronic metabolic diseases, and provides an estimate of the quality of the evidence for KD’s effects. We also describe and appraise some of the risks and misconceptions attributed to KD which may limit the widespread use of KD’s among physicians and healthcare providers.
SN  - 2573-4393
UR  - https://doi.org/10.21926/obm.icm.2102015
DO  - 10.21926/obm.icm.2102015
ID  - Lane2021
ER  -