The mechanism for Plenity, a dry cellulose matrix that expands with water, seems extremely promising, but the experimental results don’t seem that good even when selected by the manufacturer. The one study has weight loss of 6.4% of body weight with Plenity vs. 4.4% with placebo, over six months. Given the publication biases, that’s nothing.
That said, I think the metrics used for most weight loss studies, including this one, are wrong. The control and treatment groups were on equally calorie-restricted diets, and my belief on hearing the mechanism was never that Plenity would accelerate calorie deficits (although it might smooth out sugar spikes), it’s that it would make calorie restriction more bearable, which the study doesn’t seem to have checked for (which is normal for weight loss studies).
A second argument I’d consider is that weight loss is held back by different things for different people, and Plenity is extremely good for a handful of people for which satiety is their main problem. I don’t see anything in the paper that would suggest that, but it does seem possible.
The mechanism for Plenity, a dry cellulose matrix that expands with water, seems extremely promising, but the experimental results don’t seem that good even when selected by the manufacturer. The one study has weight loss of 6.4% of body weight with Plenity vs. 4.4% with placebo, over six months. Given the publication biases, that’s nothing.
That said, I think the metrics used for most weight loss studies, including this one, are wrong. The control and treatment groups were on equally calorie-restricted diets, and my belief on hearing the mechanism was never that Plenity would accelerate calorie deficits (although it might smooth out sugar spikes), it’s that it would make calorie restriction more bearable, which the study doesn’t seem to have checked for (which is normal for weight loss studies).
A second argument I’d consider is that weight loss is held back by different things for different people, and Plenity is extremely good for a handful of people for which satiety is their main problem. I don’t see anything in the paper that would suggest that, but it does seem possible.