People taking 900 milligrams of Lowat for eight weeks lost a total of nine pounds compared with only four pounds in people taking a placebo, according to findings published in Lipids in Health and Disease.
The ingredient is a 2:3 blend of extracts from Piper betle leaves and Dolichos biflorus seeds, explained Krishanu Sengupta from Laila Impex R&D Center and his co-workers.
“At the end of the study, the herbal formulation supplemented subjects experienced a greater reduction in body weight (2.4-fold) and BMI (2.37-fold) than placebo,” they wrote.
“This higher net loss of body weight can be attributed to the herbal blend supplementation rather than to dietary alteration or moderate exercise. This is because all the subjects followed a standard calorie diet of 2,000 kcal per day as opposed to being placed on a hypocaloric diet.
“By taking this approach, we wanted to mitigate the failure of individuals to comply with their dietary restrictions.
“Therefore, we believe that the results derived from this study are generally applicable to situations in which individuals adapt a more healthy living style that includes moderate exercise and diet control,” they added.
‘Important and potentially impactful research’
Paul Dijkstra, InterHealth CEO, welcomed the results and told us: “While healthy eating and moderate exercise are essential to weight management, they can be challenging for many consumers. Dietary supplement ingredients studied for their significant impact on weight loss may be an important part of successful weight management.
“Lowat’s clinical research findings are important and potentially impactful to the diverse group of consumers struggling with their weight. With daily calorie reduction and moderate exercise, Lowat supports consumers in their weight loss efforts.”
Study details
Sengupta and his co-workers recruited 50 obese participants (BMI between 30 and 40 kg/m2) to participate in their eight-week, randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled, clinical trial. Participants were randomly assigned to received either Lowat (300 mg three times per day) or placebo in combination with a 2,000 calorie diet and moderate exercise of 30 min walk for five days a week.
Results showed that, in addition to reductions in ghrelin (satiety hormone) of 17%, and the beneficial changes in body weight and BMI, the herbal blend was associated with a significant increase in adiponectin of 15%. Adiponectin is a hormone released from fat cells, which plays an important role in the regulation of insulin sensitivity and energy.
“Our observation suggests that Lowat might exert its weight reducing effects via regulation of food intake,” wrote the researchers. “In addition, our in vitro experiments also suggest that Lowat might reduce body fat by inhibiting the differentiation process from pre-adipocytes to mature adipocytes and enhancing fat mobilization from the mature adipocytes.”
Safety
The researchers also assessed the safety of the herbal formulation with toxicity and genotoxicity studies in animals and cellular models. Results of these showed “broad spectrum safety” in these tests. In addition, data from the clinical trial indicated that both placebo and Lowat groups experienced mild and equally distributed adverse events.
Source: Lipids in Health and Disease
2012, 11:176 doi:10.1186/1476-511X-11-176
“Efficacy of an herbal formulation LI10903F containing Dolichos biflorus and Piper betle extracts on weight management”
Authors: K. Sengupta, A.T. Mishra, M.K. Rao, K.V.S. Sarma, A.V. Krishnaraju, G. Trimurtulu