The last few studies I’ve posted on here seem to have been designed by their authors to show that low-carb diets aren’t all they’re cracked up to be. Of course none of these studies have used real low-carb diets – they’ve all used diets that are called low-carb, but really aren’t. They’ve set up a low-carb straw man, knocked it down, then crowed about it. These antics have left us all longing to see a study using a real low-carb diet.

Fate has dropped two studies into our hands that clearly demonstrate the superiority of low-carbs diets when matched against the high-fiber, high-cereal diet beloved of so many in the nutritional establishment and even against low glycemic index (Low-GI) diets.

In the same couple of week period two studies came out – one you’ve probably read about; the other you likely haven’t. By combining the data from these studies, we can see how these three diets match up.

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I’ve just discovered that the soft-cover version of Good Calories, Bad Calories is out.  I guess it has been out for a few weeks, but I just discovered it was available.  If any of you have been waiting for the paperback before reading this terrific book, now is the time to get it.

Since GCBC came out a year or two ago, I’ve gotten countless comments asking me what Gary thinks about this topic or that one.  And I’ve gotten comments from folks asking me to ask Gary a question for them.  I was going to interview Gary and post his responses to my questions when it occurred to me that you all might like to ask questions of him directly without having them come through me.  I contacted Gary this weekend to see if he would be willing to answer specific questions from people on this blog.  He very generously agreed to do so.

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A couple of months ago I posted several times on an Israeli study published in the New England Journal of Medicine (full-text here) showing that low-carb diets brought about more weight loss and better lipid profiles than low-fat diets.   (See the various posts here, here and here)   Based upon how the press reported this study,   I figured that it would drift into the haze of history and never be mentioned again.   After all, this wasn’t a particularly good study – there are many others better done that show an even greater effect.   And they were all forgotten.   None made any impact on the mainstream docs.   Why should this one be different?

Imagine my surprise today when I got my emailed weekly version of Medscape Internal Medicine and found not just a lukewarm recommendation for the low-carb diet, but an enthusiastic one.

Medscape is a subscription service available only to physicians and is as mainstream as it gets. The lead article in this weeks issue is not really an article, but a video lecture.   One Dr. Sandra Fryhofer lectures the mainstream docs subscribing to Medscape on what the above study shows.   She points out the weaknesses of the low-fat diet and is positively enthusiastic about the low-carb diet.   She does issue a disclaimer, i.e., that the study was partially funded by the Atkins Foundation, but that’s about all.

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I’m always amazed at the number of comments this blog gets from readers who are worried about discussing health issues with their doctors.  Most are a variant of this composite of many comments I’ve read:

I’ve been on a low-carb diet, and I’m afraid my cholesterol is going to be up a little and my doctor will want to put me on a statin.  How can I show him/her that I’m really on the right track?

Another common variant:

I want to go on a low-carb diet, but I’m sure my doctor will be against it.  What should I tell him/her?

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