Water and Weight

We are more interested in water than we are in Obesity. Yet they are connected.

A year ago the professional journal Obesity published the results of a randomized, controlled clinical trial that compares weight loss among dieters who drink water before meals with those who do not. When the people in the trial drank just two 8-ounces of that simple stuff right before each of their three daily meals, they lost about 5 pounds more than those in the trial who didn’t increase how much water they drank. The trial lasted just 12 weeks.

But almost nobody noticed that study. As much as I am personally and professionally interested in weight loss, I sure didn’t.

The senior author of the study, Brenda Davy, is associate professor of nutrition at Virginia Tech in Blacksburg, Virginia. She tried again to get the word out last week, and this time she succeeded.

This time she presented her research at the national meeting of the American Chemical Society in Boston. That’s how I and just about everyone else learned about it.

At first, I decided not to write about this study, figured that it was old news. But when I read about it in the current issue of The Economist yesterday, I knew that this was a hot topic.

Few of the more than 300 articles in the press that covered Professor Davy’s talk mentioned that this was old news. The American Chemical Society’s press release didn’t bother to tell us that.

But when I asked Dr. Davy when a professional journal would publish her research, she told me that Obesity already had published it. This is important, because publication in a peer-reviewed journal like Obesity gets a lot more credit from the scientific community than something that some professor says at a meeting.

My guess is that you too didn’t notice the report in Obesity or even one of the many articles in the press reporting on Dr. Davy’s talk. Even if you did, a gentle reminder here might be enough for some of us to take a little action.

Personally, I’m more than interested in drinking water before meals to lose weight. I took action. While I am no longer obese, my current body mass index crept up a little from all of my travels this year. At 20.1 it is higher than where I feel the best.

So I have been drinking a lot more water ever since reading about this study. And in a week my weight is down to 161 from 163. It works for me.

Professionally, I know that almost everyone else who has diabetes also struggles with his or her weight. That’s why I’m recommending that you add this simple and inexpensive appetite control to your current strategy.

All I’m asking is that you drink two 8-ounces of water before every meal and keep track of your weight. One more thing — please let this community know if it works for you too.

This article is based on an earlier version of my article published by HealthCentral.