Here's how the ketogenic diet can do wonders for your skin!

Alisha Alam | Oct 18, 2019, 11:13 IST
The ketogenic diet is probably one of the most popular diets in the world. The keto diet is a high-fat, adequate-protein, low-carbohydrate diet that gives you results fast. While most people tend to stay away from consuming oil, researchers say that consuming oil in a well-balanced keto diet might just prove to be beneficial to people. In fact, it could prove to be rather good for their skin.

"This study leads to a broader understanding of possible effects of ketogenic diets with a very high-fat content on skin inflammation and underlines the importance of the composition of fatty acids in the diet," said co-lead investigator, Barbara Kofler. "We found that a well-balanced ketogenic diet, limited primarily to long-chain triglycerides (LCTs) like olive oil, soybean oil, fish, nuts, avocado, and meats, does not exacerbate skin inflammation," explained Barbara Kofler.

"However, ketogenic diets containing high amounts of medium-chain triglycerides (MCTs) especially in combination with omega-3 fatty acids should be used with caution since they may aggravate pre-existing skin inflammatory conditions," added Barbara Kofler. The keto diet is mainly famous for its ability to help one lose weight and fast. But what's even more impressive is that it has even shown the tendency to fight multiple health diseases. Owing to this, researchers have also been looking into the keto diet as a potential treatment option for certain diseases and conditions.

The researchers further came up with the hypothesis that high-fat ketogenic diets would dampen psoriasiform-like skin inflammation progression and when teamed with partial supplementation of long-chain triglycerides (LCTs) with MCT and/or omega-3 fatty acids, this could prove to be rather beneficial for the skin.

Co-lead investigator Roland Lang said, "Ketogenic diets supplemented with MCTs not only induce the expression of pro-inflammatory cytokines but also lead to an accumulation of neutrophils in the skin resulting in a worse clinical appearance of the skin of the mice." "Neutrophils are of particular interest since they are known to express a receptor for MCTs and therefore a ketogenic diet containing MCTs may have an impact on other neutrophil-mediated diseases not limited to the skin," added Roland Lang.
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