The validity low carb diets is generally orthogonal to artificial sweeteners and probably should not be conflated.
Thus the phrase "often including..." I wasn't attempting to disprove or contribute to his claims. Just to point out an interesting intersection of diet and seizures.
Can you give a source for aspartame/artificial sweeteners being often included with low carb diet for treating childhood epilepsy? It doesn't seem intuitive to me that a diet to treat such a disease would often include something like aspartame.
Does anyone have any thoughts how Xylitol or Erythritol might fare under a study like this? They're currently my go to sweeteners. I'm not sure why they're not more popular.
That's not at all to say they're bad or poison; I love sugar-free gum a lot, but the amount of sugar alcohol in each piece is very low. The problem is just that the side effects mean that if they're widely used, eventually someone is going to crap themselves and blame your product, and almost nobody wants that.
I think one of the most important things to keep in mind when reading articles like this is the old mantra that "correlation does not equal causation". I'm always a bit skeptical when studies show partially successful statistics. I've done a lot of research on the subject at hand, and I still believe that consuming real sugar is orders of magnitudes worse than using sweeteners.
> I've done a lot of research on the subject at hand
It would be quite informative for the subject at hand for you to show your research results, if those results contradict OP findings
It's natural, but there are doubts about its safety. In many countries it is still banned. And in countries like the USA it has only been available for a short period of time (after lots of lobbying).
There aren't doubts about its safety, and reading about it a lot, I am not convinced there ever were that were based on data - seems they all had to do with scare tactics. In the USA it was available until 1991 with not a single medical case against it - and again since 1994 (simultaneously considered "safe" on its own but "not enough data to classify as safe" as an additive). Not to mention, it has more than a thous…
The doubts about its safety are mine. I am skeptic about the safety of all artificial sweeteners - especially ones new to the market - given my personal experiences with Aspartame. From most American's points of view, Stevia is new and it is being promoted by big industry. It may have been around for a thousand years, but I seriously doubt any of my ancestors in the last 1000 years consumed much of it. I am fine with it being on the market... but until more people consume it routinely for a sufficient period of time, I am not going to rush out and incorporate it into my diet.
Interestingly enough, a low carbohydrate (often including a switch to artificial sweeteners) is a well-established treatment for childhood epilepsy.
Really? Can you point to a source? Many people with epilepsy and migraines have discovered different food triggers. In my case Aspartame was the leading trigger. Anyone who has seizures should seek out and eliminate potential triggers to see if it helps. I suppose a high carb diet could be a trigger for someone... I didn't have a high carb diet... but I know eliminating aspartame helped me. I am still amazed how Dona…
The key thing to search for is "keto" or "ketogenic," the name for the high-fat, low-carbohydrate diet that puts you in a fat-burning state called ketosis.
Really? Can you point to a source? Many people with epilepsy and migraines have discovered different food triggers. In my case Aspartame was the leading trigger. Anyone who has seizures should seek out and eliminate potential triggers to see if it helps. I suppose a high carb diet could be a trigger for someone... I didn't have a high carb diet... but I know eliminating aspartame helped me. I am still amazed how Dona…
They're likely referring to a ketogenic diet. They were quite common in the past before anticonvulsant meds were created, and are still used in intractable cases today, particularly in pediatric care. There's lots of information out there about their use in epilepsy. Some to get you started: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2898565/ http://www.epilepsy.com/learn/treating-seizures-and-epilepsy... http://www…
Interesting - thanks.
[Edit] - The ketogenic diet is interesting. And I can see how some would want to substitute sugar for an artificial sweetener to help achieve a low carb diet. But given Aspartame is a known trigger for many types of seizures, it should be introduced carefully.
Aspartame (Nutrasweet) is pretty controversial in how it got approved by the FDA. See: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/robbie-gennet/donald-rumsfeld-... When I was 8 years old, I started having grand mal seizures and my parents noted a strong correlation between drinking a Diet Coke and having a seizure. When they eliminated it from my diet, my seizures declined. Fortunately I stopped having seizures around 12 years of…
That article has a lot of fear mongering about artificial sweeteners and then at the bottom an ad for "certifiedorganicevaporatedcanejuice.com". Maybe it's not the most objective source of information?
Aspartame (Nutrasweet) is pretty controversial in how it got approved by the FDA. See: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/robbie-gennet/donald-rumsfeld-... When I was 8 years old, I started having grand mal seizures and my parents noted a strong correlation between drinking a Diet Coke and having a seizure. When they eliminated it from my diet, my seizures declined. Fortunately I stopped having seizures around 12 years of…
That article has a lot of fear mongering about artificial sweeteners and then at the bottom an ad for "certifiedorganicevaporatedcanejuice.com". Maybe it's not the most objective source of information?
I think one of the most important things to keep in mind when reading articles like this is the old mantra that "correlation does not equal causation". I'm always a bit skeptical when studies show partially successful statistics. I've done a lot of research on the subject at hand, and I still believe that consuming real sugar is orders of magnitudes worse than using sweeteners.
> "correlation does not equal causation" I hate this phrase so much because it's so often used to imply that "because there is correlation it means there can't be causation" > Tufte suggests that the shortest true statement that can be made about causality and correlation is one of the following: > "Empirically observed covariation is a necessary but not sufficient condition for causality." > "Correlation is not caus…
So often used to imply what? I've seen a lot of people ignoring correlation when they really shouldn't, I have never in my life seen them using the implication backwards. How often do you see that?
Does anyone have any thoughts how Xylitol or Erythritol might fare under a study like this? They're currently my go to sweeteners. I'm not sure why they're not more popular.
Sugar alcohols can have some unpleasant side effects, which make them unpopular for general use. They can cause bloating, flatulence, and diarrhea if you consume too much of them. The pop-culture example of this is the review section on http://www.amazon.com/Haribo-Sugar-Free-Gummy-Bears/dp/B008J... , or in a less ridiculous form at en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xylitol#Safety and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erythritol#Side…
I put two tbsp of xylitol into my smoothies and I've never had a problem. It's also supposed to be good for your teeth.
I do wonder how something can be so dangerous for dogs and safe for humans. Aren't our cells almost identical?