Weight-Loss Quick Fixes Slim Wallets

Summer bummer: The season's half over and you still can't fit into that bikini. Some super-savvy marketers of weight-loss products hope they've got your number.
Pills and diet plans promising to help shed pounds in days have made the weight-loss industry a more than $62-billion-a-year , up from about $38 billion 10 years ago, estimates Market Data. But most diet pills haven't been approved for safe weight loss by the Food and Drug Administration, and products often make unsubstantiated scientific claims, consumer experts say. Dietary supplements don't need to register with the FDA nor get approval before going on sale; the FDA only takes action if the product later proves to be unsafe.
Several companies, however, promise their products will help you slip into that little black dress. And consumers seem as eager as ever to reach deep into their wallets for a quick, easy fix.
The FDA -- which just approved two new diet pills this summer for the first time in 13 years, Qsymia and Belviq -- tries to warn consumers against dangerous products by updating its list of "tainted" weight-loss supplements, meaning it has identified hidden active ingredients, and the Federal Trade Commission looks for misleading and false advertising. But with the number of new products that hit markets, officials say they find it difficult to keep up.
"These products don't require any pre-approval, and the government lacks the resources to look at more than a handful of them," said the FTC's Richard Cleland. "One of the problems is consumers assume these products wouldn't be out in the marketplace unless the FDA or FTC had approved the product, and that's just not the case."
Some companies create fake news sites with reviews of their products that they can link to on their Web sites, Cleland said.
"The most dangerous thing is the consumer is going to think the is in the pill," Cleland said. "If there was a pill out there that was going to cure the weight-loss problem, we would have it."
Some of the latest fads:
Radiofrequency waves. LipoTron 3000, ringing in at up to $85,000, is a device that's part of the larger Lipo-Ex program and uses radiofrequency waves to target fat cells. It hasn't been approved by the FDA as a weight-loss product, but as a device for pain relief and increased circulation, said Mark Durante of Advanced Aesthetic Concepts, the distributor of the product. Three medical spas reached by USA TODAY, including Tampa's Signature Medical Spa, Chicago's Sculpt Medical Spa and New Jersey's Baxt CosMedical, said the device was a non-invasive alternative to liposuction.

Super supplements. Consumers are instructed to use HCG Platinum, or "bottled confidence," in conjunction with a diet consisting only of foods from a "healthy foods list." For 30 days, dieters eat mostly lean protein and vegetables and drink two 1 milliliter drops of the supplement, which is sold at about $130 for a two-month supply. Just last month, however, the FDA warned against over-the-counter HCG products and said it issued warning letters with the FTC to companies illegally marketing these products as weight-loss aids.
"Sprinkle" crystals. Sensa is a "sprinkle" diet that doesn't require any change in the foods you eat or ramped-up exercise routines. All you have to do is add the crystals on every dish -- as simply as you would salt and pepper, its Web site boasts, to enhance smell and taste so you feel full sooner. It also points to a six-month study that showed participants lost weight, but there haven't been any studies that determine long-term effects. Sensa sells a "complete" six-month package for $289.
"This is largely, if not entirely, a complete fraud," said physician Sidney Wolfe, director of the health research group at Public Citizen. "There's no scientific evidence." In an e-mailed statement, the company said, "Sensa works for people who use it on all the foods they eat. The system is simple, but you must do your part."
What does all this mean for those desperately seeking a solution? "Popping pills or taking something because it's aggressively marketed doesn't mean it's effective or safe," said Barbara Brooks, a senior partner of the Strategy Group. "A certain amount of onus is put on the consumer."

Fen Phen Diet Pills

Of all the numerous appetite suppressants accessible currently, we think that in a battle between fen-phen and phen375, phen375 comes out on top. To understand why, lets take a look at the historical past of these two powerful fat burners.
Fenfluramine
The pharmaceutical trade, having acknowledged the trend in shoppers trying new diet capsules, began experimenting with medicine to assist the obese in getting the thin bodies  they wanted. It was during this time that Fenfluramine was launched to the  market having been accepted by the US Food and Drug Administration to offer weight loss.
Fenfluramine was in a short time withdrawn from circulation when it was discovered  that this drug had many dangerous unwanted side effects like  damaging the heart valves and inflicting pulmonary hypertension, which is a life threatening disease,  in people who had taken the drug.
Fen Phen
When Fen-phen was launched in 1996 without FDA approval, it became an immediate top seller thanks to its very effective weight reduction results.
Although docs all over America prescribed the drug to their overweight patients, the hype was brief because when Fen-phen was found to  have dangerous side effects just like fenfluramine it was very quickly removed from stores.
Phen375
Then in February 2009,  a new capsule known as phen375 came on sale with full FDA approval and was quickly taken up as a safer version of the now banned Fen-Phen.
In response to the marketers of phen375, a lot of analysis has gone into this drug with medical research being carried out on all ingredients to make sure of safety.
The Verdict
Anyone who’s on the look out for a top fat burner tablet that additionally acts as an urge for food suppressant should consider the diet pill phen375.
This  drug is supposed to not just burn body fat but in addition helps you to stop over eating and snacking.
Phen375 has been made out of pharmaceutical substances that are considered to be safe, and have no detrimental unwanted side effects.
The days of Fen-Phen are gone, and it’s now not available to buy, but Phen375 is a safe, non prescription version that still provides superb weight loss results.

Diet Pills Side Effects

Although diet pills can be very helpful in some cases, you do need to know that some of them can come with side effects. There have been some in the past that had side effects that were actually life threatening. Losing weight is important but you definitely don’t want to damage your health while trying to do it. So, here is a look at diet pills side effects you need to know about before taking diet pills yourself.
Fat Deficiencies
Many of the diet pills out there are fat blockers. Well one of the side effects that these types of pills can have is causing fat deficiencies. Sure, it is important to limit the fat that you take in, especially when you want to lose weight. However, the body does need to have a certain amount of fat or it cannot function the way that it should. Absorption of fats is important to proper body function, so you want to avoid pills that totally block out all the fats or you may end up having a deficiency that can negatively affect your health.
Vitamin Deficiencies
In some cases since diet pills can block fats and carbs, vitamin deficiencies can occur as a side effect of taking these pills.
Some of the vitamins that you may miss out on when you take these pills include Vitamin E, Vitamin A, Vitamin K, and Vitamin D. You may also miss out on the beta carotenes that you need. These vitamins are very important to your health so it is not a good thing to miss out on these vitamins. You may need to take a supplement of vitamins while you are taking diet pills in some cases.
Blood Pressure Increase
There are some diet pills that have stimulants in them. In some cases the pills can cause a blood pressure increase.
This is definitely a bad side effect for people who already have high blood pressure, those who are risk for strokes, and people that have heart problems. It is important that you try to avoid pills that are going to increase your blood pressure, since this can really be dangerous to your health.
Other Possible Side Effects
Of course there are a variety of other side effects that can occur. Some people deal with back pain, anorexia, dizziness, insomnia, and even acne. There have even been reports of heart failure, heart palpitations, rashes, depression, anxiety, joint problems, diarrhea, dry mouth, impotence, headaches, and more. In some cases people have become addicted to the diet pills they took, which can be very dangerous.

Taking diet pills can definitely help you to lose weight. However, you want to choose the best diet pills that are safe so that you avoid nasty side effects. Just be very careful when you choose these pills. The last thing you need is bad side effects as you try to lose weight.

Beyonce Wants ‘Chocolate’ Following 60-Pound Weight Loss

 LOS ANGELES, Calif. -- Caption After sticking to a strict diet to lose baby weight following the January birth of Blue Ivy, who can blame Beyonce for wanting to indulge?

“Y’all have no idea how hard I worked!” the new mom told fans during her concert at Revel Beach’s Ovation Hall in Atlantic City on Saturday night, via the Associated Press. “I had to lose 60 pounds. They had me on that treadmill. I ate lettuce!”

The “Run the World (Girls)” singer, 30, said she’s more than ready to ditch the produce for dessert.

“Now tonight I’m gonna get chocolate wasted!” she exclaimed.

Beyonce’s treadmill admission had to please a certain VIP in the audience – Michelle Obama (who has partnered with the singer in the past to inspire kids to exercise with her “Let’s Move!” campaign).

The First Lady enjoyed the concert with daughters Sasha and Malia, who happily danced in their seats to the music of Queen B, according to Us Weekly.

“They sat up in a private balcony with Gayle King. Michelle was jamming out to ‘Crazy in Love,’” a concertgoer told the mag. “When Beyonce told the crowd to get up and jump, [Malia and Sasha] stood and started dancing and jumping. They were shouting when Beyonce asked, ‘Do girls run the world?’

“Together, all three of them did the ‘Single Ladies’ dance moves,” the concertgoer added.

Nighttime fasting may foster weight loss

In an age of long commutes, late sports practices, endless workdays and 24/7 television programming, the image of Mom hanging up her dish towel at 7 p.m. and declaring "the kitchen is closed" seems a quaint relic of an earlier era.
It also harks back to a thinner America. And that may be no coincidence.
A new study, conducted on mice, hints at an unexpected contributor to the nation's epidemic of obesity — and, if later human studies bear it out, a possible way to have our cake and eat it too, with less risk of weight gain and the diseases that come with it.
Just eat your cake — or better yet, an apple — earlier. Then wait 16 hours, until breakfast the next morning, to eat again.
"We have to come up with something that is a simple alternative to calorie counting," said Satchidananda Panda, a regulatory biologist at the Salk Institute in La Jolla who led the study published online Thursday by the journal Cell Metabolism.
Panda and his team put groups of mice on different eating regimens for 100 days. Animals in two of the groups dined on high-fat, high-calorie chow. Half of them were allowed to eat whenever they wanted, and nibbled on and off throughout the night and day. The other mice had access to food only for eight hours at night, when they were most active.
In human terms, this would be rough: No ice cream while watching "Glee." No second glass of wine while talking things over with the spouse. Not even a late-night glass of warm milk.
The difference was astonishing. Even though they ate a high-fat diet, the mice who wrapped up their eating day early and were forced to fast for 16 hours were lean — almost as lean as mice in a control group who ate regular chow. But the mice who noshed on high-fat chow around the clock became obese, even though they consumed the same amount of fat and calories as their counterparts on the time-restricted diet.
Extra weight wasn't their only problem. The obese mice developed high cholesterol, high blood sugar, fatty liver disease and metabolic problems. The mice who ate fatty food but were forced to fast showed hardly any signs of inflammation or liver disease, and their cholesterol and blood sugar levels were virtually indistinguishable from those of mice who ate regular chow. When put on an exercise wheel, they showed the most endurance and the best motor control of all the animals in the study.
The data suggest that the stomach, the brain and the body's digestive machinery need to take a break from managing incoming fuel; otherwise, we may be working ourselves into a state of metabolic exhaustion. When combined with high-calorie, high-fat diets, the result is weight gain, a liver clogged with fat, accumulation of cholesterol in the arteries and unused glucose in the blood.
In the mice who fasted for 16 hours daily, measures of digestive hormones, cholesterol and glucose suggested that liver enzymes were working hard to break down cholesterol into bile acids. The body's stores of "brown fat," the stuff that converts extra calories into heat, were revved up, and the liver ceased production of glucose. As they burned fat, their body temperatures were actually higher, Panda said.
The results of daily fasting were "phenomenal," he said.
If only we were mice.
Leo Garcia, a 37-year-old auto mechanic whose adult years have been a steady march up the scale, said he was intrigued by the notion that he could lose some of his 250 pounds by wrapping up his mealtime early and resisting the urge to nibble. "It seems easier to do something like that than to join a gym and do cardio," he said.
But the study drew both exasperation and cautious interest from obesity researchers, who underscored that lab mice aren't tempted by fast-food restaurants with late-night specials and have no alternative to the menu and feeding schedule set by lab technicians. Being nocturnal, they also have different circadian clocks. The conclusion that humans could prevent or reverse obesity by wolfing down steak and chips for eight hours and then stopping for 16 would be premature and almost certainly dangerous, some said.
"I hope it's true, but I doubt it," said Barbara Corkey, director of obesity research at Boston University School of Medicine.
Barry M. Popkin, a nutrition expert at the University of North Carolina, said the study plies "uncharted territory" that needs exploration. A clinical trial published in 1992 suggested that eating frequent, small meals resulted in better insulin control and longevity.
"This one study cannot tell us that this science is wrong," Popkin said. "However, it is suggestive that scholars in the diabetes, obesity and other areas related to heart disease need to test this issue further in animals and humans."
Panda acknowledged that his research would need to be refined and tested in humans before it could be used to fight the war against obesity. The 16-hour fast that was so effective in preventing obesity in mice "may not be a magic number" for people, he said.
But extending the nighttime fast is a cheap and simple dietary adjustment that has no discernible side effects and doesn't require anyone to count calories or even deprive themselves — unless you just can't watch a playoff game without a beer or can't fall asleep without tea and honey.
All you need is a clock, said Panda, who noted that most after-dinner snacks are high in fat, sugar, salt and calories, and are best cut out anyway.
Research into the basic drivers of obesity — both social and biological — are under greater scrutiny than ever. Pharmacological help for the nation's 78 million obese adults and 12.5 million obese children has been elusive, as have the keys to behavior change for enduring weight loss.
Scientists acknowledge that obesity results from a complex mix of genetic and environmental factors, such as sedentary lifestyles, consumption of sweetened soft drinks, growing portion sizes and the increasing role of calorie-rich restaurant meals in American diets.
Panda thinks researchers may be overlooking the role that timing has on the body's response to food. In the agricultural lifestyle of an earlier time, Americans ate heartily but were thinner. They did chores, then had a big breakfast, followed by more physical activity, a hearty lunch, work and an early dinner. Soon after the sun set, it was time to sleep.
"Most people ate mostly in daytime," Panda said. Today, "our social life starts at sunset. Family time starts at the evening. So essentially, we have increased our eating time in the last 40 to 50 years."

Weight Loss Success: Tammy Garcia Ditched The Fad Diets And Lost Nearly 80 Pounds

Name: Tammy Garcia
Age: 29
Height: 5'5"
Before Weight: 204 pounds
How I Gained It: I was never really a thin person, but I grew up doing ballet and other various forms of dance since I was 3 years old, so I was a healthy size up until I graduated from high school. At that point, I quit dancing, started college and I let the freshman 15 get to me. But it didn't stop there. I kept gaining weight through my time in college, and graduated at about 155 pounds. Once I graduated from undergrad, I moved away from home. That was the first time I was required to do all my own shopping and cooking, and it did not go well. Have you ever noticed that the foods on sale are the unhealthy ones? Chips, sugary cereals, cookies, bagels -- I got caught in that trap. I got caught in the "I'm too busy to cook between work during the day and school at night, so I'll just have fast food" mentality.
After four years of eating unhealthy and focusing more on work and grad school studies than on making sure I was healthy, I had allowed myself to get to over 200 pounds. Only once did I even try to lose weight. In 2009, when I couldn't fit into a bridesmaid dress I had just ordered about two months before, I knew I needed to do something about it. I tried a fad diet plan I was recommended. It worked in the short term, and I lost almost 30 pounds and ended up having the dress taken in for the wedding. But then I moved to a small, backwoods town. I stopped the fad diet, and I allowed those excuses to be in charge again. It was back to fast food and making excuses that it was "too hard" to find the healthy foods in a small southern town that didn't believe in eating healthy. So that weight came right back on in a matter of a few months.
Breaking Point: My breaking point came in August of 2010 when it was time for me to buy some new pants. My work pants were old and they were getting kind of tight so I went shopping for some new ones. But I couldn't fit into a size 14, and I struggled to fit in a size 16. I refused to buy pants that were a size 16 or bigger. It would have been the biggest size I would have ever bought and I just couldn't allow myself to do it. I had simply had enough of being big. I had enough of being unhealthy. I wanted something better for myself. I knew that I had lost weight before, so I was sure I could do it again.
How I Lost It: I had family coming into town in about two months and so I created an eight-week challenge for myself. It was "Operation Make Pants Not Fit in a Good Way in Eight Weeks." I realized this time that I didn't want a gimmicky fad diet. I wanted something that I would be able to maintain for the rest of my life. I wanted to really learn how to live healthy instead of relying on some sort of pre-packaged nonsense that wouldn't really teach me how to eat in the real world.
I knew the best way to do that would be to cut out fast food, cook healthy meals at home and start exercising. I went to the bookstore to buy some healthy food cookbooks, hit Amazon.com to buy some workout videos and the sporting goods store for some exercise clothing. I joined the site Livestrong.com to track my calories and joined a group challenge.

At first, I only did cardio (I didn't have a gym membership, I had my workout videos and an elliptical machine at home, but no weights). By the time my family came into town, I was able to buy a size 12 pair of pants, and I had lost around 20 pounds. I was proud, but I knew there was a long way to go. So I kept at it, adding in weight training with a nice little set of weights my husband bought for me and learning how to make more and more healthy meals using fresh ingredients. Now, I sit down with my husband every Sunday and we plan out our meals for the week, and then hit the grocery store together. When we plan vacations, we make them active vacations where we can go hiking in the mountains, for example. It makes it so much easier being in this new lifestyle journey together.
I've been maintaining my current weight for almost a year now, but I've worked on getting stronger. I'm always challenging myself to lift more weight or go one more rep when I'm weight training. I've done the Insanity program and I throw in those workouts on my cardio days and it's still a challenge. I'm always pushing myself to go further, harder and longer.
The biggest realization I've had, and why I've been able to maintain this time around, is that I've realized there is no "easy" way to lose weight. There's no magic pill, no magic "diet," nothing like that. It's a matter of working out, staying active and eating healthy. It really is a lifestyle, not something you do for a little bit and then go back to what you were doing before. It is simple, but it takes dedication and commitment to make the changes that are necessary. It takes time and effort. But the rewards are more than worth it. I've gone from not being able to fit into a size 14 to wearing a size 0 or 2. I am happier, more positive, less sick, in pain less and I just feel better all around.
After Weight: 127 pounds

100 Million Dieters, $20 Billion: The Weight-Loss Industry by the Numbers

Getty Images

When you're trying to lose weight, the number that seems to matter most is the one you see on the scale. But there are plenty of other compelling numbers coming out of the growing weight-loss industry. Check out a few below and watch the full story on "Losing It: The Big Fat Money Pit" on "20/20," Friday at 10 p.m. ET.

$20 Billion

The annual revenue of the U.S. weight-loss industry, including diet books, diet drugs and weight-loss surgeries.

108 Million

The number of people on diets in the United States. Dieters typically make four to five attempts per year.

85 Percent

The percentage of customers consuming weight-loss products and services who are female.

1 Hour

The amount of time spent on daily exercise by people who lost and kept off at least 30 pounds of excess weight for five years.

220,000

The number of people with morbid obesity in the United States who had bariatric surgery in 2009.

$11,500 to $26,000

The average cost of bariatric surgery, which reduces the size of the stomach.

$500,000 to $3 Million

The average salaries paid to celebrity endorsers of major weight-loss programs.

$33,000

The amount of money celebrity endorsers, on average, earn per pound lost.

$5,594

Cost for a week-long (six night) weight-loss program at Beau Rivage Palace, a luxury hotel in Lausanne, Switzerland. The program includes massages and personal training sessions and discourages deprivation.

2

The number of glasses of wine per day allowed to guests of the Beau Rivage Palace weight-loss program.
Sources: John LaRosa of MarketData; National Weight Control Registry; American Society for Metabolic and Bariatric Surgery; Jo Piazza, author of "Celebrity Inc.: How Famous People Make Money.