Ketogenic Diet Intervention on Metabolic and Psychiatric Health in Bipolar and Schizophrenia: A Pilot Trial (2024) (PMID 38547601)
Here are the findings from its abstract:
> Results showcased improvements in metabolic health, with no participants meeting metabolic syndrome criteria by study conclusion. Adherent individuals experienced significant reduction in weight (12 %), BMI (12 %), waist circumference (13 %), and visceral adipose tissue (36 %). Observed biomarker enhancements in this population include a 27 % decrease in HOMA–IR, and a 25 % drop in triglyceride levels. In psychiatric measurements, participants with schizophrenia showed a 32 % reduction in Brief Psychiatric Rating Scale scores. Overall Clinical Global Impression (CGI) severity improved by an average of 31 %, and the proportion of participants that started with elevated symptomatology improved at least 1–point on CGI (79 %). Psychiatric outcomes across the cohort encompassed increased life satisfaction (17 %) and enhanced sleep quality (19 %).
This is fine for psychiatric patients, but for everyone else, a real ketogenic diet adds substantial risks as documented in these studies:
1. Ketogenic diets inhibit mitochondrial biogenesis and induce cardiac fibrosis (2021) (PMID 33558457)
2. Ketogenic diet induces p53-dependent cellular senescence in multiple organs (2024) (PMID 38758782)
The problem is that what actually counted as a ketogenic diet in the psychiatric study will get lost in its application, getting misinterpreted as a high-meat high-fat diet, which it wasn't.