Dr. Oz featured it on his show and now the nation is ecstatic over the latest fad diet – hCG. Is it safe and does it work? Read this to find out if it’s all that it’s cracked up to be.

The newest fad diet is the hCG diet and people are head over heels in love with it. It’s as if the miracle diet has finally hit the market. The diet claims to help people lose:

• A pound or two a day
• Up to 30 pounds in a month
• Instant weight loss with no hunger

Too Good to be True?

While it seems as though it’s the best way to lose weight, it may not be all that’s cracked up to be. Sure – you’ll drop weight faster than you could have ever imagined. You won’t even have that craving for food that you have with other diets.

The problem is this – the likelihood that you’ll keep it off is low. You’re only allowed to eat 500 calories a day. Diets that rely on starvation have proven to cause people to regain the weight they lost after they stopped dieting.

Your body goes into starvation mode and when you start eating again, it wants to keep everything you are consuming in case there’s another period of “starvation.” It’s your body’s way to protect you. It doesn’t know that you are dieting and trying to lose and keep off the weight intentionally.

All that work you did only eating a turkey sandwich each day will go to waste. You’ll be slim for a few months and right back to where you are now in another few months. It doesn’t seem worth it, does it? Well, here’s some more information on the worth of this diet.

No one can eat only a sandwich and feel satisfied all day. To keep you from foraging for food and feeling famished, the hCG diet involves taking the hormone daily.

hCG (human chorionic gonadotropin) is a hormone women produce when they conceive. This hormone suppresses appetite in non-pregnant women and men when taken in high doses. You can take hCG by injection or ingesting liquid drops.

The United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has warned the public that using weight loss aids with hCG are illegal and potentially unsafe. While the FDA has yet to find out how the supplements affect health, they continue to research it to advise people the potential health hazards associated with them.

The Centers of Disease Control (CDC) already know the effects of low calorie diet. People have a higher risk for gallstones, hair loss, constipation and many other health issues. When combined with hCG, it’s uncertain how detrimental it could be to health.

Is it Effective?

There’s speculation that the hCG supplements don’t work. Studies have shown that people who simply think they are taking hCG, while really ingesting a placebo, had the same appetite suppression. Therefore, it’s not actually the hormone that staves off hunger, but the thought that it does.

The mind is a powerful motivator and you can do just about anything when you convince yourself of something. Tell yourself you aren’t hungry and you’ll stop feeling starved. Tell yourself that the large slice of chocolate cake is disgusting and you don’t want to eat it and you can calm your craving.

So why is that you can’t lose weight in a healthier manner by simply using your mind and eating less? There’s temptation everywhere that makes it difficult for you to convince yourself without depending on the influence of a sup plement like hCG.

The Reality of Dieting

People are desperate to lose weight and they want to do it quickly with the least amount of suffering. hCG has made this a reality for many people. Even with the reports that the diet can lead to serious health condition, many favor looking good over being healthy.

The only thing is that people can achieve the same results as the hCG diet in a healthy way without having the rebound weight gain. Changing your diet so you eat healthier food and increasing your physical activity is the best way to lose weight and keep it off. Your body will learn that it doesn’t need the extra calories and you won’t feel hungry after you’ve changed your eating and activity levels for a few days. You can’t be on a diet forever and to keep diet weight off, you have to be. Change your lifestyle to be the healthy person you want to be for the rest of your life.