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Article Series: Weight Loss & Dieting
How Do I Really Lose Weight?
Diet
Pills: What Are the Different Types Available?
Americans spend billions of dollars each year
on diet pills. This article will objectively examine what diet
pills are, and whether or not they work.
Three
basic types of diet pills exist:
- Appetite
Suppressants;
- Fat
Burners;
- and
Fat Binders.
Appetite
Suppressants
Appetite
suppressant were designed around the belief that the cause
of a person’s weight problem is their
insatiable hunger.
Many people believe that if they only knew when to stop
eating, they could lose weight; but since they always feel
hungry,
they just keep on eating to try and quell the feeling.
Enter the appetite suppressant, built for that very purpose,
to
quell the feeling. Appetite suppressants suppress the psychological
motivation for eating.
Fat
Burners
The
functions of fat burning diet pills are twofold: they act
on the hypothalamus, the part of the brain associated
with
regulating appetite (similar in this function to the way
the appetite suppressants work), and they release certain
chemicals into the brain that trigger the Fight or Flight
mechanism, otherwise known as the Stress Response. In this
latter function, the body is triggered to prepare itself
for action, as might happen in the wild should prey sense
a predator nearby. This stress-response requires the body
to burn more calories and, thus, triggers the body to burn
up whatever calories it has at a faster rate, even whilst
at a state of rest.
Fat
Binders
Fat
binders function by binding the fats that are inside the
stomach, thereby preventing the body from digesting
and absorbing
them. Instead of adding the extra fat to the body’s weight,
then, the binded fat in the stomach is eliminated as waste.
A commonly-heard nickname for fat binders is “fat magnets.” Purportedly, fat binders contribute not only to weight loss
but to lower cholesterol levels as well, though in truth the
amount of chitosan (the active ingredient responsible for the
effect) in fat binders is too small to have any but a negligible
effect on cholesterol levels. Therefore, fat binders should
not be considered as a viable alternative to a lower cholesterol
diet and, in cases, other cholesterol lowering drugs your doctor
can prescribe.
Those are the three different functions of diet pills. Regardless
of function, diet pills also come in three different forms.
1.
By prescription – Prescription diet pills are attainable
only with a doctor’s prescription and, presumably, under that
doctor’s regular monitoring and care. These are heavily regulated
by the US FDA. Prescription diet pills are meant for use by
individuals who are greater than 30% overweight, and are intended
to be used on a short-term basis, generally fewer than six
months, and are not advisable at all for people under the age
of 16. A person can lose as much as 10% of their body weight
on prescription pills.
2.
Over-the-counter – A prescription is not needed to purchase
these, and they are widely available at drug stores, supermarkets,
and discount stores. They are also monitored by the FDA.
3.
Herbal – Herbal diet pills are rarely regulated
at all as the US FDA considers them more of a food than
a drug, with
little if any medical benefit at all.
The use of diet pills to lose weight presents a whole host
of problems. Some are regulated and some are not, though
rarely does the consumer know or understand which is which,
nor why it matters. Many more people use diet pills improperly,
without proper supervision or against recommendations to
the contrary. In this consumer-centric landscape of ours,
when everything we need and want are at our virtually immediate
disposal, we’re conditioned to buy and consume first, ask
questions later. But some of these questions could have dire
answers.
People’s
bodies often become tolerant to the effects of diet pills
and they starting putting on more weight again. Often
this will cause a person to take more of the drug or take it
longer than recommended. All pills can have mild to severe
side effects, for example:
- Appetite
suppressants, which contain stimulants like caffeine,
can raise the blood pressure and
heart rate, resulting in an
increased risk of heart attack or heart disease;
- Fat
blockers can cause painful gas and diarrhea;
Whether you use diet pills to lose weight or not, all effective
weight loss programs require the incorporation of a healthy
diet and regular exercise into your daily life.
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SolveYourProblem.com
: 2008
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