Some nutritionists frown upon them, but according to new research, crash diets based on single foods can be used to shed excess pounds swiftly and safely -- and may work better than counting calories.
British dietitian Carolyn Summerbell says overweight volunteers who lived on a milk-only diet for 16 weeks dropped more than 20 pounds each -- significantly more than those on a calorie-controlled diet, and one in which the milk was supplemented by a different form of food each day.
Her study, published in the British Medical Journal, involved 45 patients with severe obesity at Londons St. Bartholomew's Hospital.
Summerbell said that while such simple, novel diets are unpopular with the nutritional establishment, "for a short period of time they are effective."
Furthermore, she says her work indicates that the human body tends to know when it has had enough of such a diet. People get fed up with eating a single food, which stops them from staying on it too long, when it might be bad for them."
