Went over to my friends house last night and his wife recently started the South Beach Diet. I have been on the Atkins diet now since January (though I've not made much progress for some reason since July, even with adding 40 minute cardio 3x week). Back to the subject, she was harping on my becuase the main staple of my diet is hamburger, love the stuff and eat it for one meat at least six times a week. Her main concern was that in the South Beach diet book it says that there has been new information about fats that was not known when Atkins proposed his diet, mainly the fact that after eating a meal high in saturated fats this causes the persons arteries to constrict and continued eating like that could cause a stroke. I have noticed several times that after eating my nice high fat double burger lunch that I get dizzy but I've always shrugged that off as a side effect of the low carb diet. Have things changed with how we should go about doing the Atkins diet? I have to admit that I've not been keeping up with the new information beside adding potassium and magnesium to my diet.

Atkins states that you must take a suppliment when losing weight (induction, OWL and pre-maint) because all the water we drink washes many of the nutrients away. I take a multi and extra pottasium and extra Vit. C. I know that when I don't take my suppliments, I don't feel 100%.

The South Beach Diet is low fat/lower carb if I remember from the book - - it does not promote the stage of Ketosis as Atkins does. Ketosis flushes your fat and the fat you eat out of your system so it does not clog anything up in side of you. Thus the healthy blood workups that we get.

"When people lose weight on the Atkins Diet, cholesterol goes down because the body switches from a sugar metabolism to a fat metabolism. As long as the person stays beneath their critical carbohydrate tolerance (the point at which the body no longer burns fat for fuel), cholesterol will not go up. The only way cholesterol will rise on the Atkins program is if the dieter goes back to eating excessive carbohydrates, which is not recommended on the Atkins program. When an Atkins dieter reaches their goal weight and is on the maintenance plan, if their carbohydrate tolerance level allows them to take in a lot of carbohydrates without going to excess, then we recommend cutting back on saturated fats, and incorporating more monounsaturated fats such as olive oil, avocado, seeds and nuts, into the diet."

"In short, a diet that controls carbohydrate consumption correctly, as the Atkins Diet does, is not dangerous, in fact it is probably very beneficial to the heart as it reduces risk factors. A controlled-carbohydrate diet allows your body to burn fat rather than store it, lowering cholesterol. It is the combination of fat and carbohydrates that is dangerous, not fat on its own."

Quoted here

I'm not talking about a rise in cholesterol. In the South Beach Diet book it says that if you eat a meal high in saturated fats you suffer from a temporary constriction of the arteries after eating that meal. They go on to say that this type of information wasn't known when Atkins wrote his book. Its that point that I'm trying to get some clarification on.

I have never heard that before, but I have not read the South Beach Diet book. That sure is a frightening thought! I definitely intend to research it and see what I can find out. I'm a big meat eater so I, too, would like clarification on that issue. Thanks for bringing that to our attention. Even though I'm totally sold on locarbing and Atkins, I'm not afraid to listen to opposing views. Things are everchanging in this world and I like to keep up. Thanks!

Hey, Thanakar, I didn't find ANY studies on Pubmed about "saturated fats you suffer from a temporary constriction of the arteries." The saturated fat studies I did find had a lot of misinformation in them about cholesterol and risk factors, and they were older.
What I know about saturated fats are that SOME people are sensitive to them, and it does raise certain cholesterol levels. Most people go ahead and get great blood numbers as long as they stay away from transfats, which do have great potential for harm.
I've only read about South Beach online and flipping through the book at a bookstore, I wasn't impressed with his research or his idea of a diet. He seems stuck between the old thinking about fats and the new thinking about carbs.
The new studies show that stroke risk comes from cholesterol too low, and insulin too high. Saturated fat is slowly being rehabilitated. A good source for questions about fats is "Know Your Fats" by Mary Enig. Here's what she has to say on the subject:

"The physiology of fats and cholesterol is fully covered in Chapter 2. Almost half of this chapter is devoted to shattering popular myths about saturated fats. Not mincing any words, Enig methodically demonstrates the faulty data and reasoning behind the ideas that saturates either cause or contribute to heart disease, diabetes, colon cancer, mental illness, obesity and cerebrovascular disease. For example, after trashing the “data” that supposedly prove that beef and beef fat caused colon cancer, Enig flatly concludes: “And now, more than three (3) decades after the initial fraudulent report, the anti-animal fat hypothesis continues to lead the nutrition agenda. It was a false issue then, and it remains a false issue today.”

Subsequent chapters deal with fats and oils historically used in Western diets; the fatty acid composition of various oils and fats such as coconut, butter, lard, and olive oil; and a succinct summary of “fat facts.” The book is rounded out by detailed appendices on definitions, fatty acids in a huge number of foods and molecular compositions of major fatty acids.

Most interesting is Enig’s insider take on the nutritional research world and the forces that work behind the scenes to manipulate the facts. Never one to shy away from controversy, Enig blasts such organizations as the American Dietetics Association, the Center for Science in the Public Interest, the American Heart Association, and the food industry in general. She accuses research scientists who denigrate foods containing saturated fats as “flat-earthers.”

Check her out on the web, she's a fascinating and outspoken scientist.

http://www.westonaprice.org/book_reviews/know_your.html

Here's another nice article, for the really "skinny" on fat.

http://www.westonaprice.org/know_your_fats/oiling.html

Read up and impress your friends! Dr. Enig feels that the real villains are actually VEGETABLE OILS and TRANSFATS, just the stuff the supermarket is full of.

Long live butter!

Thanks Adkpam, I'll definitely read those articles as I am a litlte confused about what are good/bad fats. I have experienced a rise in my cholesterol and am wondering if I'm going to drop from a heart attack or stroke if I continue eating all the fat I do. It would kill me to not be on this diet as it is the only way I have been able to drop my weight.

Yes alot of information has been discovered since Atkins origionaly proposed his diet in 70'something. That is why there is at least 10 different revisions of his book, and his latest book Atkins for life. After writing his diet plan, Atkins didn't sit back and just let royalties come back. They have wonderful weight loss clinics and research facilities that are constantly updating ideas and advice based on latest studies and observation from the millions of clients who use the clinics.

If you are using a version of New Diet Revolution for the 70's, then I would say it is deffinetly time to udate. You can also get many of the most up to date studies performed by people outside of Atkins on the Atkins web site under the section "The Science Behind Atkins".

I read the southbeach book and do not remember if there was a source for his claim of arterial constriction, and he does not say why it is bad. He also has some bad info on what healthy fats are, so I take anything he says with a grain of salt. If you are getting dizzy, you probably need a potasium supplement. That happened to me and the potassium solved the problem.

I hear you, Jackie S, and of course every body is different. I haven't had blood work done, but since eating all this fat my BP is "optimum" so I'm happy.