For dropping those extra pounds Weight Watchers ranked No. 1 in the ratings by U.S. News & World Report, followed closely by Jenny Craig and the Raw Food Diet, while the DASH diet was deemed best overall diet, with the Mediterranean Diet coming in second."Our analysis put hard numbers on the common-sense belief that no diet is ideal for everybody," the magazine said on its website.
"The DASH (Dietary Approaches to Stop Hypertension) diet beat out 19 others, among them Atkins, Jenny Craig and Slim-Fast, to win the 'Best Diets Overall,'" it added.
Researchers looked and compiled profiles on 20 diets, which were reviewed by a panel of 22 experts in diet and nutrition, diabetes and heart disease.
The rankings were based on scores in seven categories -- short-term weight loss, long-term weight loss,
easiness to follow, nutritional completeness, ability to prevent or manage diabetes and to manage heart disease.Each diet was also judged in five categories including best overall diet, best commercial diet plan, best weight-loss, best diabetes diet and best heart-healthy diet.
DASH also came out first for the best diabetes diet, followed by the Mayo Clinic diet, while the Ornish Diet captured the top spot for heart-healthy diets with TLC (Therapeutic Lifestyle Changes) diet coming in second.
"Exercise gets serious attention in some diets and lip service in others,
but the primary focus of a diet, after all, is food. Whether to exercise, how, and how much is a lifestyle decision beyond the scope of a mere diet," the magazine added.About 34 percent of U.S. adults aged 20 and over are overweight and an equal number are obese, according to 2007-2008 figures from the Centers of Disease Control and Prevention.
The DASH diet was never intended for teen girls, but that doesn't mean it's ineffective.
Originally created to treat adults with high blood pressure, the Dietary Approach to Stop Hypertension (DASH) diet is showing new promise in reducing weight gain in teenage girls. According to USA Today, girls whose diet most resembled DASH showed the smallest increase in body mass index (BMI) over 10 years in a new study.
They also recorded the lowest BMIs during the study's follow-up period.
The diet plan itself essentially cuts out red meat and many forms of carbohydrates, focusing on fruits, vegetables, lean meat and whole grains. According to DashDiet.org, the main focus of the plan is to reduce salt intake, which helps to reduce blood-pressure in older dieters.
The study followed 2,379 girls between the ages of 9 and 10, and tracked them for 10 years, according to the LA Times. While the participants were socioeconomically and geographically mixed, over half the girls in the study were black.The study was especially important, the LA Times reported, because those who showed the best results, didn't even fulfill all of the DASH requirements. Even those in the 95th percentile had a higher than recommended sugar intake and did not necessarily eat the recommended number of servings of fruit per day, were they actually following the diet.
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