I battled my weight for over 12 years and was doing everything “right” to shed the extra pounds. I exercised my a** off and tried calorie restriction. Nothing worked, except that I got in great shape under a big layer of fat.

Last fall (2009) I was introduced to the HCG protocol and after reading it, I knew for sure that this would work for me. I started at 164 pounds and approx 35% body fat. I lost 21 pounds of fat in 35 days. I did a second round of the protocol 6 weeks later and lost another 10 pounds. I went to my local university’s “Human Performance Lab” to be hydrostatically weighed and I came in at 20.4% body fat. My body fat tests confirmed that I lost all fat on the protocol and no lean body mass. I ended at 133 pounds and a size 2-4.

I also had metabolic testing done before and after, using the FDA approved Korr REE. My pre-protocol REE was 1700 cal/day. Post 2nd protocol it had increased to 2025 cal/day. I would be really interested in having a doctor explain to me how my REE could increase after shedding 33 pounds of fat. To me, the only explanation is that losing fat has allowed my kidneys and liver to function more optimally. It is my understanding that kidney and liver function account for about 40% of the body’s metabolic needs.

It has been a year since starting the protocol and I have maintained my weight within 5-7 pounds. I am a self-admitted “carb addict” and I am yet to truly overcome the addiction. It is a daily battle to accept reality that I need to abide by a low-carb diet to maintain my loss.

I also found Gary Taubes book after losing weight and it has made a huge difference to how I view food. To me, his book really helped to explain why I had success on the HCG (the protocol diet is approx 72g of carbs in the form of veggie, fruit and melba toast plus 200g of lean meat, which is about 48g of protein). It seems to me, from my understanding of Taubes research, that when a person is meeting their basic protein needs, they ARE NOT starving, despite being on a very low calorie diet. The body is free then to look for the extra calories it needs from the fat storage. I have never succeeded at losing weight on any other diet (trust me, I tried them all) because I would get hungry. The mere fact that i could go 35 days on 500 calories without hunger is amazing.

I actually am conflicted about the role of HCG in weight loss. I think that it is very possible that it is a placebo. But, even if it is, it worked and the weight loss came from fat (also, the fact that I was sticking a needle in my leg every day helped me stick to the plan and take it more seriously). I actually have a friend whose father followed the protocol diet, without the HCG and lost over 20 pounds in a month. He is a physician and is convinced that the HCG is a placebo. Either way, it proves that a very low calorie diet with adequate protein can result in rapid fat loss without hunger.

This is a great website that I just found yesterday. I have ordered Protein Power and I am looking forward to reading it. I have read multiple books over the last year in an attempt to better understand human nutrition and the low carb, whole foods approach just makes the most sense to me.

Simple as that.

Hmmm. A theory I had never considered.

I’m quite capable of changing my mind if I’m proven otherwise, but in this case, NOT!

Bottom line is that HCG works for lots of people.

People who doubt it’s ability to ‘work’ will hopefully not be a person who needs to lose weight. It’s a very effective program and becoming quite popular simply through word of mouth because people who are on it and losing are perfect walking advertisements in it’s effectiveness.

I think that would beat any scientific data any day and either way, believer or non believer or whatever else, the bottom line is that people are losing weight and getting healthy and we can leave it to the ‘scientist’ to figure out ‘why’ or ‘how’ or whatever.

So anyone who has had a hard time losing weight and want a fast and effective diet, just Google HCG and conduct your own experiment on yourself, that might not fit all the criteria’s dictated by EADES, but I think quite sufficient if it changes your life and gets those pounds off!

I don’t gain anything from monetarily nor is someone’s belief or non belief in the effectiveness of HCG in conflict with my need to sell a book or product. Just give it a chance to work for you!

Many can’t do it. There is truth in that quote about science progressing by the death of scientists.

I’m sure there are cases. But you’ve got to get the patient to believe, and you can’t do it unless he/she thinks some kind of treatment is being administered.

Three days ago (day 40 of VLCD) I was given by my doctor an increased HCG dosage – from 150mg to 170mg. I was hopefully anticipating even greater losses over the next week of increased dosage.

To my surprise, the day that I took the increased dose I became ravenously hungry – starving, in fact. Why? Because too much HCG can have the same symptoms as too little HCG: great hunger. Not only that, but that day was the first day that my ketone levels dropped considerably, whereas before they unfailingly showed high levels. I hadn’t changed my diet, or done anything else differently. The next day I immediately lowered my dosage back to 150mg, have had continued losses, and my hunger almost immediately went away again. Placebo effect? I don’t think so.

Each point I made from real experience you’ve dismissed without addressing…
immunity, hunger while on NaCl, rapid onset of a ketogenic state, that
if placebo effect alone there should not have been a drop out rate
more than twice as high in the placebo group.

Some people suggest that any drop outs in a double blind study would negate all results. It’s true that the Asher Harper Study should have adjusted results based soley on those who completed the study. I don’t believe the study provides complete info on which subjects dropped out, so unable to adjust their conclusions with study data. But the final numbers are all there.

Just to appease your negative view – I crunched some numbers – and recalculated the average loss for the hCG group – removing patients 1, 9, 14, 38 – 1 & 9 about midland at 14.5 lbs lost, 14 & 38 having the largest losses (41.5 lbs & 31.75 lbs respectively)

The hCG group lost 3.5% more weight over the placebo group even using negative bias. (just so you know – removing all 4 of the biggest losers from those receiving hCG – and the hCG group still lost over 2.5% more than the placebo group.)

To analyze more fairly – assuming those with the smallest % loss in each group were the drop outs – removing 5, 7, 9 & 38 from the hCG group and averaging by the number that actually completed the study – the average loss was 22.519 lbs… removing subjects 25, 33, 6, 26, 20, 10 & 39 from the placebo group and averaging by the number that actually completed the study – the average loss was 15.71 lbs. This more even handedly adjusted recalc shows the hCG subjects on average lost 42 % more weight.

hCG is causing greater weight loss – 10-14% of total body weight gone in 30 days with no exercise, it’s not the psychological impact.

* * * * *

While I have the calculator out – if you need a 3500 calorie deficit to lose 1 lb – based on a BMR of 2250 my first round – at the end of 32 days by deficit the most I could have lost is 16 lbs… but I lost 30 lbs. According to some that defies any logic – and many would call me a liar if not for my periodic posts on YouTube and the scores that have followed since.

“placebo effect” – the first 2 days of the protocol are “load days” when it’s suggested to eat foods high in carbs and bad fats while dosing with hCG – generally I’d estimate people eat about 4,000 cals on the load days – and based on 3500 cals per lb – no one should gain more than 3 lbs. Yet – is pretty common for people to gain 8-10 lbs in 2 days of loading. 8 lbs (using 3500 cal per pound) would be an astronomical 28,000 calories in 2 days – most people dread the load days as they know they’ll gain weight – does that sound like placebo effect to you ?

You seemed to imply a certain doubt to Dr Harper’s integrity regardling the study since he ran an hCG clinic. To the best of my knowledge Dr Asher – a member of the American Society of Bariatric Physicians Research Council – would have no alterior motive for slanting a study one way or another.

I’d be embarrassed to say how many hours I’ve spent going over studies & personally collected data from those I’m in contact with prior to posting to your blog. Now if you consider that I sell kits for the protocol because of the bad wrap the medical community has given it – and as an alternative to going to a high priced clinic – why in the world would I want a credible physician to come forward with positive results with the hope of getting primary care physicians onboard ? ( assuming it’d become widely used at reasonable price and there would be no need for high priced clinics, expensive medications or DIY – and there goes my little income stream )

It’d be to my financial detriment for a respected physician such as yourself to hit the broadcast circuit touting the protocol’s effectiveness and calling into question the legitamacy of the FDA’s position as well as the negative studies. (though if you want to thank me in the foreward of your book on the effectiveness of the protocol for my tenacity I guess I won’t complain) Why am I doing it then ? The greater good. I’d like to think I was a small part of the solution.

You can either stick with your opinion based on poorly run studies, or try the protocol with a handful of obese patients and see the truth. There are enough inconsistencies with the negative studies that I hoped you’d dig deeper, be willing to challenge conventional thought – I could be barking up the wrong tree. Until someone actually does a more thorough investigation (as previously mentioned who would fund one with billions on the line for far less effective pharma) no one will know for sure why it works as well as it does. Insulin, leptin, IGF-1…

You said it yourself – “Changing closed minds is a tough – and usually thankless – proposition.” You refer to the negative reports as “well-conducted scientific studies” – not acknowledging the Franks study from the meta was not even in the same ballpark as the Simeons protocol with the exception of injecting hCG. But you DO want to challenge the Asher Harper study (which is warranted but I think fairly adjusted above)

Discount all the studies, discount my data and observations – start with a clean slate and the truth will out.

“…I had spared no pains nor expense to accomplish the great end of stopping and curing obesity.” – William Banting – Letter on Corpulence – 1864

No, I fear the truth wouldn’t will out. At least not in your mind. If I were to conduct the most meticulous randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled study in the history of medicine, and it showed HCG to be no better than placebo, I’m fairly certain that you would believe the study somehow flawed because it didn’t confirm your bias.

I’ll make you a deal. You arrange funding for such a study, and I’ll get it done. It will have to be funded by you or some outside source because funding will never come from any of the normal sources of scientific-inquiry funding because there are at least 20 studies out there showing HCG to be no better than placebo, and any of these funding agencies won’t be willing to throw good money after bad. If you do come up with the funds for the study, I’ll make you a guarantee. If the study shows HCG to be no better than placebo, you won’t believe the results. That’s my guarantee.

As you pointed out – “significantly more people on placebo dropped out” which skewed the Asher Harper study… BUT – if the placebo group THOUGHT they were receiving real hCG – shouldn’t the drop out rate have been similar between groups if it’s just placebo effect ?

I mentioned in my first post it’s rare to find someone NOT on hCG to be able to stick with a 500 cal diet. I couldn’t make it 1 hour when I had my bout with immunity, and would assume anyone on placebo would feel like that for a month.

But as to my specific tests for a study in the 21st century – body comps would be the breakthrough as far as analyzing effectiveness of the protocol – IF someone could make it 30 days on 500 cals without hCG they might lose 30 lbs as well as the hCG paitent, but they’d be losing significantly more weight from the loss of lean muscle mass, whereas the majority of the weight from those receiving hCG would be body fat. That’s the theory at least – and to date I know of no study that bothered to determine where the weight loss came from.

As far as the Asher Harper study – they mention in the very first paragraph that the majority of negative studies significantly altered the original protocol. And they DO mention they did not expect to see significant differences in loss, just that the patient on hCG felt better.

If it was a true double blind study – and the literature makes it clear it was – should make no difference if Dr Harper ran an hCG clinic – as he’d have no idea during the study which patients were receiving the placebo vs. the real thing.

Would I question the results of a study you did on a high protein low carb diet ? Guess it depends on how much integrity you think someone has. As far as physicians go I hold you in pretty high regards, which is one of the only reasons I bothered to post in the first place, that and because I suggest your book to many to follow after the protocol.

4-4-3-2 … yeah, that must be healthy ’cause the govt says it is. And cigarettes AREN’T addictive… and STATINS are a GOOD thing. Of all the physicians out there – wouldn’t think you’d be one to just accept studies not knowing who might have influenced them. Guess I’ll make an open invitation on YouTube for anyone to do a real double blind. But would be really good for you to try the protocol with a few patients and THEN post your personal observations.

Thanks again.
Tim

You wrote:

I think you missed the point. Let’s say I have a study in which there are 20 people starting in each group with one group on HCG and the other on placebo and both groups consuming 500 kcal per day. Let’s assume for argument’s sake that neither the HCG nor the placebo have any effect on weight loss and that all the weight lost by the subjects over the course of the study comes about because of the caloric restriction. Now let’s assume that six people drop out of one side of the study and two people drop out of the other, and lets say that each person staying in the study until the end loses 10 pounds. So in one arm of the study, the one where only two people dropped, the total weight loss of the group is 180 pounds (18 people finishing the study losing 10 pounds each). In the other group the total weight loss is 140 pounds (the 14 people remaining in the study times 10 pounds each). If you calculate the average weight loss of all the people completing the study, you come up with 10 pounds each. But if you instead do like the guys did in this study and calculate based on the number of people starting the study, then the one arm (the HCG arm) shows an average weight loss of 180 lbs/20 or 9 pounds per person. The other arm (the placebo arm) shows an average weight loss of 140 lbs/20 or 7 pounds per person, which makes it look like the HCG is causing greater weight loss while it really isn’t.