Research

Energy balance

Meal replacement diets significantly reduce oxidative stress (measured by urine lipid peroxides) during weight maintenance compared to food-based diets, independent of the magnitude of weight loss.

If you are concerned about long-term health markers like oxidative stress, a structured meal replacement diet may offer additional benefits beyond just weight loss, specifically in reducing oxidative stress markers during the maintenance phase.

GoodSupportsMEDIUM confidence
At week 40, ULP levels in the MD group decreased a mean of 1.3 micromol/g creatinine (17.5%), compared to 0.2 micromol/g creatinine (5.4%) among the FB group... which represented a significant difference between groups (Mann Whitney U = 145, Z = -2.07, p = 0.04)
Lisa Davis et al. · Nutrition Journal · 2010

Why this rating

RCT design, but the biomarker (ULP) is less standard than CRP or lipid panels, and the effect was only significant at week 40.

Source

Efficacy of a meal replacement diet plan compared to a food-based diet plan after a period of weight loss and weight maintenance: a randomized controlled trial

Lisa Davis et al. · Nutrition Journal · 2010

DOI 10.1186/1475-2891-9-11

rct · n=90Cited 115×
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DOI resolved against Crossref · corpus check 2026-06-10

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