Losing Weight after Menopause with Minimal Aerobic Training and Mediterranean Diet
1
Department of Human Sciences and Promotion of the Quality of Life, San Raffaele Roma Open University, 00166 Rome, Italy
2
Department of Systems Medicine, University of Rome “Tor Vergata”, 00133 Rome, Italy
3
Division of Cardiology, University of Rome Tor Vergata, 00133 Rome, Italy
4
School of Human Movement Science, University of Rome “Tor Vergata”, 00133 Rome, Italy
5
Institute of Clinical Biochemistry, Clinical Molecular Medicine and Laboratory Medicine, Department of Biomedicine, Neuroscience and Advanced Diagnostics, University of Palermo, 90127 Palermo, Italy
6
The Evelyn F. McKnight Brain Institute, Department of Neurology, Miller School of Medicine, University of Miami, Miami, FL 33136, USA
7
Laboratory of Cardiovascular Endocrinology, IRCCS San Raffaele Pisana, 00166 Rome, Italy
*
Author to whom correspondence should be addressed.
Nutrients 2020, 12(8), 2471; https://doi.org/10.3390/nu12082471
Received: 5 July 2020 / Revised: 10 August 2020 / Accepted: 14 August 2020 / Published: 17 August 2020
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Diet, Nutrition and Chronic Degenerative Diseases)
Objective: It is a common belief that menopausal women have greater difficulty losing weight. The aim of this study was to assess the efficacy of a Mediterranean diet (MD) to promote weight loss in postmenopausal women. All participants were prescribed a hypocaloric traditional MD, tailored to the individual. Subjects were asked not to begin any kind of physical activity. Body composition was measured at the beginning and after 8 weeks of treatment. In total, 89 women (age 52.8 ± 4.5 years, BMI 30.0 ± 5.2 kg/m2, fat mass 31.6 ± 10.5 kg) were divided into two groups: the first group consisted of fertile women over 45 years of age, the second group consisted of those diagnosed as menopausal. All women had an improvement in body composition (fat mass −2.3 ± 2.1 kg, p < 0.001; protein −0.1 ± 0.7 kg, p = 0.190) and blood pressure values. No differences were found between the two groups except for a higher reduction of low-density lipoprotein in the menopausal group (p = 0.035). A positive significant correlation between plant to animal protein ratio and fat-free mass variation was found in the menopausal group. These data suggest that a high adherence to a traditional MD would enable menopausal women to lose fat mass and maintain muscle mass with no significant difference to younger women. Fat mass reduction provides menopausal women with improved cardiovascular and metabolic risk factors.
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Keywords:
Mediterranean diet; body composition; menopause; weight loss; chronic degenerative diseases
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MDPI and ACS Style
Lombardo, M.; Perrone, M.A.; Guseva, E.; Aulisa, G.; Padua, E.; Bellia, C.; Della-Morte, D.; Iellamo, F.; Caprio, M.; Bellia, A. Losing Weight after Menopause with Minimal Aerobic Training and Mediterranean Diet. Nutrients 2020, 12, 2471.
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