Research
Hormonal
Alternate-day fasting does not significantly improve high-density lipoprotein (HDL), fasting blood sugar (FBS), or homeostasis model assessment-insulin resistance (HOMA-IR) compared to control groups in the short term.
While ADF helps with weight and cholesterol, you should not expect it to automatically fix your blood sugar or insulin resistance in the short term (under 12 weeks). If you have insulin resistance, you may need to combine ADF with exercise or other strategies.
GoodRefutesHIGH confidence
At the same time, the analysis demonstrated that the ADF group had a same effect compared with control group in aspects of high-density lipoprotein (p = 0.27), homeostasis model assessment-insulin resistance (p = 0.55), and fasting blood sugar (p = 0.09).
Why this rating
Based on the same meta-analysis of 7 RCTs.
Source
Health Effects of Alternate-Day Fasting in Adults: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis
Yuanshan Cui et al. · Frontiers in Nutrition · 2020
DOI 10.3389/fnut.2020.586036
Meta-analysis · 7 studiesCited 55×
Read the paper DOI resolved against Crossref · corpus check 2026-06-10
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