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The keto diet is high in fat and low in carbs, with a moderate amount of protein.
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Men who are overweight and have low testosterone may benefit from following a very-low-calorie ketogenic diet, a small, preliminary study suggests. Researchers presented their findings this month at the European Congress of Endocrinology after studying the effects of the very low-carb and high-fat diet in 17 middle-age men with obesity.
Study participants shed a substantial amount of weight, helped curb their percentage of body fat, and increased their testosterone levels. “The low-calorie keto diet represents a therapeutic nutritional intervention to treat obesity with a great effect on weight loss and, consequently, on testosterone levels,” says one of the authors of the study, Angelo Cignarelli, MD, PhD, of the section of internal medicine, endocrinology, andrology, and metabolic diseases at the University of Bari Aldo Moro in Italy.