Has anyone tried the Beyond Diet?

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4/21/13 7:29 A

No - I like my plant based way of eating

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4/21/13 7:16 A

while the premise seems to be OK, I believe I've learned most of those concepts elsewhere for free (and, to be truthful, I didn't spend a lot of time on their site).

I recently purchased a special group of books (electronic versions) covering a wide range of healthy topics for $39, which I think was a better investment.

I'm not sure I'm allowed to post the link here for those, though.

see the BalancedBites website for a listing/link

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3/2/13 7:41 A

Wondering if anyone can help? I just started looking into the Diet Solution Program. I didn't purchase anything but just looked into it online. I have a question about meal choices. If I am a protein type and for dinner I am suppose to have 5 protein, 1 carb and 2 fat, then how is it that in the sample menus it lists 1 cup of beans as my 1 carb but then also lists a salad with veggies (which are more carbs)? Any clarification would be appreciated.

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11/7/12 10:13 A

I purchased the Beyond Diet program about 5 months ago. It is an awesome program. I am a heart patient but since i have lost 42 lbs I am no longer on any medication other than Lipitor. It is all about eating whole natural foods and staying away from processed foods. I have yo yoed my weight for years. I truly believe this is a plan I can stick with

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10/28/12 10:41 A

I find popular diets suspect with their fabulous claims and especially statements that contradict recognized sources. For example, BeyondDiet places Canola Oil in the avoid category yet here is what the Mayo Clinic says: "Canola oil is generally recognized as safe by the Food and Drug Administration. In fact, canola oil is very low in saturated fat and has a very high proportion of monounsaturated fat, so it's a healthy and safe choice when it comes to oils."
I trust the Mayo Clinic yet the Beyond Diet has converts.
What to do???

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4/24/12 8:27 P

Why, oh why do we not have a hammer emoticon? 'Cause Radiotikspark nailed it. I really, really wish our schools would teach everyone how to read research papers, or at least how to recognize the difference between a research paper and a random opinion article. It would go a very long way toward making our people a little more scam-proof.

Fifty dollars isn't a lot to lose, but it's still a shame that people are being charged *anything* for a little information they could get free plus a little BS. (And a quick glance at the website suggests that they're not even all getting their BS-- one of every three comments on each forum I looked at was about downloads not working.)

Okay, I just looked a little more at the website, and I take back the "a little BS" part. There's a LOT of BS. A boatload of BS. They're selling protein powder and claiming it will "slim you down while you sleep."

Puh-leeze!

I was going to write that "Well, telling people to eat better isn't exactly a scam. It's a waste of $50, but at least it's not harmful..."

But no. When you get into the website and see all the c*ap they're selling and the silliness of the advertising ("Our fish oil is 47 times better for your health than regular fish oil!" Oh really? What units is "good for your health" measured in?)... sigh. Scam city.

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4/24/12 5:46 P

I'm just trying to sift through that cut and paste there. It seems to have come right off the Beyond Diet webpage. A reading list with no results isn't much use to us. I know I shouldn't even respond. This is straying into the cringe worthy, "Someone is wrong on the internet" territory (xkcd.com/386/), but it just hurts me deep inside when people are being taken in by trash masquerading as science. It isn't your fault, it is the charlatans who promote it and take people's money. The key to not being taken is is approaching these claims critically. The list you posted is a very good start.

I have all of my first year undergraduates read through Carl Sagan's "Baloney Detection Kit" from the book Demon Haunted World. I kind of see it as a basic primer that every student and every person should have to test the various pseudoscientific claims that they are forced to deal with in their every day life. Much of Sagan helps here. Lets go through what you posted. For ease, I have numbered your references from 1 to 9, in the order you posted them.

Step 1:
The vast majority of those are *books*. Anyone can publish a book about anything. They are not reputable, they are not peer reviewed, they do not constitute evidence for anything and should not enter this discussion. This eliminates numbers 1, 2, 5, 6, and 9.

Step 2:
Ancient reference to something different. Your list contains a 1945 book by the globe trotting dentist who sort of (but not all the way) started this fad. He was an interesting, if terribly eccentric fella, and we anthropologists love that, for all his eccentricities, he recorded the pre-globalisation tooth quality of many of the people of the world (I've come across him before), but he was VERY VERY specifically talking about diet and presence of tooth decay in the publication that you posted. He questionably extrapolated more later, but your reference is *not* to metabolic typing so we have to take away number 4.

Step 3:
The Peer Reviewed Papers. So there seems to be at least two, maybe three peer reviewed papers on this list. However, there are serious problems with each one:

In Number 3 (Piatti et. al, 1994), there is no discussion of metabolic typing whatsoever. Here are the stated conclusions from that paper:

"In conclusion, our experience suggests that (1) a hypocaloric diet providing a high percentage of natural protein can improve insulin sensitivity; and (2) conversely, a hypocaloric high-polysaccharide-CHO diet decreases insulin sensitivity and is unable to spare muscle tissue."

Cool! Interesting! Nothing at all to do with metabolic typing. They are saying that they found that a high percentage of natural protein improved insulin sensitivity...IN EVERYONE, not just people of some randomly created metabolic "type".

In Number 7, Westphal et al. (1990), there is also no discussion of metabolic typing. Furthermore the conclusions drawn in this paper are only based on the responses of FIVE people www.ajcn.org/content/52/2/267.abstract, so even if it was about metabolic typing (it isn't), there would not be enough people in the study for the results to have statistical significance.

Step 4:
Now number 8, Wolcott (1983). First, the citation is incomplete. It is also incomplete on the list that you got this off of (www.beyonddiet.com/Members/Pages/Resources
right?). Because of this I can't actually figure out where this paper is supposed to have been published. Do they mean Brown University's International Health Institute? Do they mean the Canadian International Health Institute? Or was this put out by some shady pseudoscientific entity. Interestingly I cannot find this paper online anywhere. It doesn't exist on pub med and google is only showing me metabolic typing reading lists. It is also written by the person who monetarily benefits from you believing in this, William Wolcott who pocketed your $50. William Wolcott is not a doctor. He is the person getting rich off the Metabolic Typing Diet.

So all of those references are either unsuitable, unrelated, or not credible.

One last note: Wikipedia is a *tool*. It is not a source to cite on its own, it is a compendium of knowledge, a starting off point for discovering more information about the topic because usually wikipedia entries provide a list of references to follow. Note that the entry that I originally linked you to did just that, and I only quoted information from Sloan-Kettering and the an investigative report on the topic. Of course you can't cite wikipedia at University...but you can cite the references you find through wikipedia.

Edited by: RADIOTIKSPARK1 at: 4/24/2012 (18:10)

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4/24/12 11:30 A

The metabolism test I took made me more aware of how foods affect how I feel - before I got into Beyond Diet/DSP I wasn't totally aware of those things - Beyond Diet opened that up for me and for that alone it was worth the money I spent on the program.

Now I know I'm most likely not going to change anyone's mind, but since others have provided me with their opinions and research to back that up, I will provide my own. Before I do that, I will say this, personally I don't put much stock in most things on Wikipedia because most anyone can post information there; in fact, a lot of colleges won't allow students to cite it in light of the vast amount of inaccurate information contained there. Also, regardless of your opinions about Dr. Mercola, he is not the only doctor "advocating" metabolism typing. Here's a bit of my research:

Abravanel, E. D., & Morrison, E. K. (1983). " Body Type Diet and Lifetime Nutrition Plan". Batnam.
Mein, C., D.C. (2001). "Different Bodies, Different Diets". New York, NY: HarperCollins Publishers Inc.
Piatti, P. M., et al. (1994, December). "Hypocaloric High-Protein Diet Improves Glucose Oxidation and Spares Lean Body Mass: Comparision to Hypocaloric High-Carbohydrate Diet". Metabolism, Vol. 43 (12), 1481-87.
Price, W. A. (1945). "Nutrition and Physical Degeneartion: A Comparison of Primitive and Modern Diets and their Effects.” La Mesa, CA: Price Pottenger Foundation.
Rogers, W. J., PhD, (1956). "Biochemical Individuality". New York, NY: Wiley and Sons./ (1998). New Canaan, CT: Keats Publishing.
Schmid, R. F., N.D. (1987). "Native Nutrition: Eating According to Ancestral Wisdom". Rochester, NY: Healing Arts Press.
Westphal, S. A., et al. (1990, December). "Metabolic Response to Glucose Ingested with Various Amounts of Protein". American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, vol 52, 267-72.
Wolcott, W. L. (1983,). "A Theoretical Model for Clinical Application of the Relationship Between the Autonomic Nervous System and the Oxidative Rate in the Determination of Metabolic Types and the Requirements of Nutritional Individuality" Metabolic Technology I. International Health Institute,
Wolcott, William, and Trish Fahey (2000). The Metabolic Typing Diet. New York, NY: Doubleday.

Have a nice day!

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4/23/12 7:38 P

"I know if I eat carbs for breakfast (oatmeal, etc.) I will be hungry in an hour, but if I eat a couple of eggs and a piece of fruit, I stay satisfied for 3-4 hours. I also know if I don't eat protein regularly I get a headache and feel irritable."


You don't have to pay money or have a metabolism test to get info on what to eat for breakfast.


This article gives similar advise:

Whole-egg or egg white omelets with fresh or frozen veggies (carrots, broccoli, celery, peppers, onions and even black beans make great additions)
.
www.sparkpeople.com/resource/nutrition_art
icles.asp?id=64

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4/23/12 7:25 P

Thanks Tikimami!

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4/23/12 5:32 P

MISSSVJS, A good place to start on the dubiousness of Metabolic Typing is Wikipedia:

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metabolic_typing

First of all, it was invented by a dentist. I love dentists, my sister in law is one, but that is like me making up some sort of metabolism-related claim just because I have a Dr. in front of my name.

Second, I will just quote directly:

"Metabolic typing claims to use common visible symptoms related to the skin, eyes, and other superficial parts of the body to assess different aspects of a person's metabolism and categorize them into broad metabolic types. In addition, some proponents of metabolic typing use tests such as hair analysis to determine a person's "metabolic type""

You do understand that there is absolutely no science to support this, right? That such things are not based on any controlled scientific study whatsoever? Just because someone who wants to sell you a book uses this, doesn't make it real.

"The Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center website notes that "...retrospective reviews of the Gerson, Kelley, and Contreras metabolic therapies show no evidence of efficacy."

"Some metabolic typing companies use a battery of blood and urine tests performed by reputable laboratories, but interpret the results in an unconventional and medically questionable fashion. During a 1985 investigation into one such firm, an investigator sent 2 separate samples of his own blood and urine for analysis. He received 2 drastically different "metabolic typing" reports and dietary plans."

Okay, so actual doctors, looking at a complete picture of all anecdotal and actual research into the idea of a metabolic type or metabolic type based therapy say that it isn't effective and the whole deal is based on medically questionable readings of real scientific tests.

Next off, just google: "Does Metabolic Typing Work" and you will find pretty much no one reputable who will answer yes. To quote one article I found: "Having particular sensitivities to foods or preferences for foods doesn’t equate with the need for a different macronutrient composition in your diet." Heck, even alternative medicine and crazy homeopathy websites think it really isn't supported by anything at all.

Moving forward, you say that metabolic typing is used by real doctors, however I took a cruise around Pubmed www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed and found no papers supporting metabolic typing. I have done the following searches on google and come up with nothing:
Metabolic typing scientific study
Metabolic typing peer reviewed
Metabolic type peer reviewed study

Etc. etc.

Apparently the main person who pushes metabolic typing is a Dr Joe Mercola:
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Mercola Among other bits of insanity, Mercola questions whether HIV causes AIDS, rather that AIDS comes from "psychological stress". He is against all prescription drugs and immunizations and believes that sunscreen increases the likelihood of skin cancer. etc. etc.

If you have anything scientific or even a little bit reputable, I would love to see it.

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4/23/12 3:19 P

Well I didn't know I would need to spell out the entire program to prove it's worth the investment for some people, but here goes. Beyond Diet/Diet Solution Program includes a quick start guide which is an easy-to-understand summary of the program for folks wanting to get going right away, more in-depth information is contained in the full manual, 14 days of meal plans while you learn the program, the metabolism type test along with meal plans based on that type (including vegetarian meal plans), helps you determine your daily caloric needs, offers tons of recipes, a success journal on the website to track daily food intact and exercise, along with online support including daily newsletters, and lots of other great nutritional and lifestyle information.

I'm not trying to talk anyone into buying the program, but since someone specifically asked about it, I thought I would contribute my experience with the program.

Would you please cite your sources to back up your statement that the metabolism test is "entirely made up/impossible"? Medical doctors and nutrition pioneers have used metabolism typing for decades. It has helped people not only experience dramatic weight loss but also overcome severe chronic disease, obesity, and other serious disorders.

From my own personal experience, I took the test and tested as a protein type. This makes perfect sense to me since I know if I eat carbs for breakfast (oatmeal, etc.) I will be hungry in an hour, but if I eat a couple of eggs and a piece of fruit, I stay satisfied for 3-4 hours. I also know if I don't eat protein regularly I get a headache and feel irritable. Now this doesn't mean I don't eat carbs, I do, I just eat more protein than carbs along with good healthy fats (organic coconut oil, EVOO, organic and/or raw butter, raw cheese). I also know if I eat a high carb lower protein diet I gain weight and I feel bloated and lethargic but if I eat a high protein lower carb diet I either maintain or lose, I'm not bloated and I have tons of energy.

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4/23/12 12:57 P

"It's about consuming whole foods - organic when possible; grass fed meats, free range chicken, cage-free eggs, etc"
This is available free through both the internet and a variety of really wonderful books written by real doctors and experts. They are available at every library. I can offer you a list.

"take the metabolism test to determine if you are a protein type, carb type or mixed type"
That is entirely made up/impossible.

I'm trying to understand paying $50 for this. It sounds like what I walked away with reading a couple Michael Polan books, watching some videos on netflix, and joining the local natural food co op. Frankly, it was remarkably easy and my fella and I are *much* healthier and happier for it. $50 for something that only takes a trip to the library and a couple hours reading time?

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4/23/12 12:01 P

I purchased the program a little over a year ago (t's also called Diet Solution Program). It's definitely NOT a rip-off. I think the problem people have experienced is a lack of understanding that the program is a downloadable program for the price advertised (seems like it's around $50), but if you want them to send you the actual books, there's an extra charge for that.

As far as the program itself, it is awesome! I'ts not a diet - it's a way of life. It teaches you a way of eating that can sustain you for the rest of your life. It's about consuming whole foods - organic when possible; grass fed meats, free range chicken, cage-free eggs, etc. After reading the material, the first thing you do before starting the program is to take the metabolism test to determine if you are a protein type, carb type or mixed type. The website offers respectful support, tips, newsletters, recipes, etc. It takes some folks a while to wrap their heads around the whole program, but people report feeling much better while losing substantial amounts of weight - getting themselves off of medications, controlling diabetes, high blood pressure, high cholesterol, etc. Personally I follow it as a way of maintaining my weight, which was my main purpose of purchasing the program. If I need to lose a few pounds, I simply follow it a bit more strictly. I honestly don't think there's a healthier way of eating than this plan.

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4/22/12 9:52 A

That's what I was wondering. Thanks!

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4/22/12 9:51 A

I don't know anything about the diet itself, but when I googled it there are a lot of hits on scambook.com which is a website that reports complaints of patrons of online purchases. Several people report having purchased the materials from the site (for various prices which is strange) but are not able to log-in or access the materials. Looks like it's a ripoff!! BEWARE!

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4/22/12 9:41 A

I just read about it online and it sounds like it has some reasonable concepts. It costs money but not a whole lot. Has anyone done this? Any success or tips?

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