Intermittent fasting has an array of health benefits, according to a published review article in The New England Journal of Medicine.
From animal studies to human clinical trials, the review article authored by Mark Mattson, a neuroscientist from Johns Hopkins University, dissects different fasting regimes and their health benefits for humans.
Mattson explains the process of metabolic switching, one of the key processes triggered by intermittent fasting. There is a change in the production of energy when an organism is deprived of food. It shifts from readily accessible glucose in consumed food to ketogenesis, a process wherein ketone bodies are produced during the conversion of fat stores. The shifting process refers to metabolic switching.
Mattson’s review reveals that frequent shifts between the two metabolic states can produce various health benefits. “Periodic flipping of the metabolic switch not only provides the ketones that are necessary to fuel cells during the fasting period but also elicits highly orchestrated systemic and cellular responses that carry over into the fed state to bolster mental and physical performance, as well as disease resistance,” write Mattson and co-author Rafael de Cabo.
Their review also explains alternate day fasting, which focuses on significant caloric restriction on one day or more each week, and time restricted feeding, which is fasting for a period within the 24-hour cycle and prohibits all caloric intake to a period of no more than eight hours.
Mattson and de Cabo claim that physicians apply intermittent fasting dietary strategies on treating patients at risk of diseases, such as dementia and cardiovascular disease. Based on their analysis, gradually increasing fasting periods over a number of months is the most effective way to implement such dietary changes.
“Patients should be advised that feeling hungry and irritable is common initially and usually passes after two weeks to a month as the body and brain become accustomed to the new habit,” Mattson explains.
“We are at a transition point where we could soon consider adding information about intermittent fasting to medical school curricula alongside standard advice about healthy diets and exercise,” Mattson concludes.
