How do HCG Diet Programs Work?

You've heard about the apparent miracle of HCG diet programs that succeed when other diet plans fail. You're probably wondering what the catch is, or if indeed HCG even lives up to the hype.

In light of recent history and the nature of the marketing world, such cynicism and skepticism is understandable; however, once you understand that the HCG program is based on solid scientific and medical principles, you'll see how simple and effective it really is. To begin however, we need to go back in time over half a century to a place on the other side of the world.

One Doctor's Experience

In the 1950s, an endocrinologist from Great Britain name A.T. Simeons was conducting research on patients in that country's former colony of India. He was studying two groups of patients:

• expectant mothers suffering from malnutrition
• males suffering from obesity due to pituitary gland dysfunction

More specifically, Dr. Simeons was interested in how a mother's food deprivation affected the fetus. He found that the hormone known as Human Chorionic Gonadotropin (HCG) produced during pregnancy played a role in protecting the health of the fetus during gestation.

During the same period, he found that administering small doses of HCG to obese patients caused their bodies to consume the energy stored in fat cells, resulting in weight loss. Eventually, Dr. Simeons concluded that doses of HCG combined with a low-fat, high-protein diet was the key to effective weight loss.

The Biochemical Mechanism

Hormones are biochemical substances excreted by our endocrine glands and are responsible for regulating many physiological processes in the body.

At the base of our brains is a small, nut-sized gland known as the hypothalamus. This gland regulates our overall metabolism, which is how our body uses energy in food. Under normal conditions, when our bodies are deprived of food the hypothalamus responds by slowing down our metabolism in order to conserve resources, i.e., fat stores. This is why most traditional diets fail.

HCG works with the hypothalamus in such a way that when caloric intake is cut to a bare minimum, our bodies are forced to make up the difference by consuming fat stores. Since most of us require between 1,500 and 2,000 calories a day and HCG diet programs call for no more than 500, your body will have to burn up to a 1,000 calories a day in order to maintain normal metabolism.

Doesn't One Get Hungry?

There is likely to be some feelings of hunger during the first day or two of following HCG diet programs, but because your body will be making up the calorie deficit from your fat cells, this discomfort passes quickly. Many people continue these eating patterns even after the diet is over, simply because they feel better.

In order to find more information on HCG diet programs, including sample recipes, testimonials and sources for HCG, go to http://www.hcgdietdirect.com/