Are Slimming Pills Really the answer to easy weight loss

Slimming pills are little tablets you take on a regular basis with the aim of helping you lose weight. The market is currently overrun with diet pills with many making incredible claims of being the ultimate quick fix.

If you want to lose weight quickly for your holiday, need help to shift a couple of stubborn pounds or always find it difficult to get started on a diet, slimming pills maybe the answer for you. But please choose carefully depending on your lifestyle.

To decide which one is best for you first you need to understand the different mechanisms for promoting weight loss. Remember different approaches will work for some people but not others.

• Fat burners – fat burners are dietary supplements that trigger an increase in basal metabolic rate due to active ingredients such as ephedrine, caffeine and aspirin. They are also known as thermogenics and increase the number of calories burnt even at rest by increasing the body’s temperature slightly.

By using a good fat burner supplement you can burn fat quicker due to speeding up your metabolism. Some fat burners’ burn calories as heat but others also claim to stimulate the release of adrenaline or act as appetite suppressants.

These slimming pills may seem like a dream come true but as with most medicines there are side effects that you need to be aware of before deciding to take them. For example ephedrine is addictive, if taken frequently you might not be able to stop. It can cause symptoms such as dry mouth, anxiety, headaches and more seriously seizures and irregular heart palpitations.

If you do decide to take fat burners and notice any side effects it is important to stop taking them immediately, your health is more important. I know it is tempting to take a quick fix to solve body issue problems but seriously your health is just not worth it.

• Fat binders – fat binders work by gathering the fat and preventing it from being digested. The active components disseminate through the intestine and bind a proportion of the fat molecules that come from the food, preventing them from being absorbed and incorporated into the body. It is eliminated along with the faeces.

Some fat binders are naturally derived from plant extracts like cacti and aloe-vera which have been used by nomadic tribes to suppress the appetite to cope with long periods of near-starvation. Although different kinds of fat binders have different properties, the basic idea is that they help weight loss by reducing the amount of fat absorbed from food. This can have a dramatic effect on calorie intake with a number of clinical studies showing that it is possible to achieve a 30% fat reduction from meals which equates to approximately 150 calories per meal.

Are there any side effects? Generally fat binders are safe and it has been difficult to find any side effects through my research. The most common would be the increase in bowl movements, particularly if you don’t restrict your fat intake. Well if its not being absorbed it has to go somewhere. Some vitamins, such as A, D, E, F, and K, are fat soluble, the long-term use of fat blockers can lead to vitamin deficiencies. I did read somewhere that Alli is being investigated by the American Food and Drugs Administration due to reports of serious liver damage. I don’t however know how true that claim is.

They use a variety of drugs to manipulate hormonal and chemical processes in the body that control hunger pangs and the sense of feeling full. These effects are achieved by their action on various brain neurotransmitter pathways.

There are lots of very good websites that describe the technical process of how these slimming pills work. I don’t want to regurgitate that information here so if you are interested have a read of how appetite suppressants work and e how health. As for side effects their appetite reducing effect tends to decrease after a few weeks which is why they are only useful for the first few weeks of a weight loss programme. There are more serious outcomes of taking these pills. Epidemics of fatal pulmonary hypertension and heart valve damage have been associated with these medications and have led to the withdrawal of several such products from the market. So be careful if choosing these pills.

• Carb blockers – carbs blockers work in essentially the same way as fat burners. Most people find carbohydrates one of the hardest things to cut from our diet as these are what you crave when hunger hits. They are generally composed mainly of bean and wheat germ extracts and are said to inhibit a digestive enzyme that breaks down starchy carbohydrates, such as pasta, bread and potatoes. This stops that carbs from being absorbed by the body. Most pills claim to inhibit between 30 to 40 grams from being absorbed.

As with fat blockers the main side effect of carb blockers is an increase in bowl movements if you remain on a high carb diet. Well that’s obvious isn’t it. Other reported side effects include bloating, gas, nausea and vomiting. Manufacturers claim that these are a sign that the pills are working!

• Superfoods – superfood is a term often used for foods that are high in vitamins, mineral and many other nutrients. As nature’s powerhouses, superfoods contain most of the recommended daily intake of vitamins and minerals. Healthy diets that incorporate superfoods will help maintain your weight, fight disease and improve your well-being.

When trying to shed excess pounds, including a superfood supplement into your weight loss programme could, it is thought, give your body that extra dose of energy to rapidly lose weight.

Researchers have found that superfoods have antioxidants that may protect cells from damage and may possibly help against diseases such as heart disease and cancer. But when it comes to weight loss evidence is lacking and the hype seems to have come before the science.

Are there any side effects? There are many different superfood supplements on the market, most containing natural ingredients so side effects are rare. I would suggest that, as with anything you start taking, you check the ingredients to make sure you are not allergic to any.

So do slimming pills work?

It is very likely that by taking any of the slimming pills in this section of the website will help you lose weight. But to keep it off you need to have a change in attitude about food. If you carry on eating the way you always have once you stop taking the pills, and you will have to at some point, you will put the weight back on.

Read the following articles to find out which slimming pills other e-slimmers have had success with.