Group Questions Safety of Atkins Diet

Nov. 20, 2003 -- For two-and-a half years, Jody Gorran faithfully followed the Atkins diet, regularly eating steaks and Caesar salads and forgoing bread, pasta, and other carb-packed foods. But his devotion to the high-protein, low-carbohydrate way of eating came to an abrupt end late last month when he underwent an emergency balloon angioplasty to open up a clogged heart artery.

Gorran says the diet gave him heart disease, and he believes he can prove it. A heart scan conducted six months before he started the diet showed no evidence of the plaque or calcification routinely seen in people with heart problems. But after two years on the Atkins diet he had developed angina and had a 99% blockage in a major artery.

"I feel victimized by Atkins. I feel angry and betrayed because even though this diet has been out there for years, they have not done the long-term studies to prove that it is safe," Gorran tells WebMD.

Group Links Diet to Danger

The activist group Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine agrees, and its members are calling on the CDC to more closely track people on diets like Atkins. The goal, says PCRM president Neal Barnard, MD, is to more easily identify long-term health problems that may be linked to following diets that are high in saturated fats and protein and low in carbohydrates.

The PCRM is a controversial group that advocates good health and nutrition through a strict vegetarian diet. On their website, they make associations between multiple medical conditions and eating animal-based foods. These include linking arthritis pain, bone fractures from osteoporosis, and development of multiple sclerosis to eating dairy products.

At a PCRM-sponsored news conference held today at the National Press Club in Washington D.C., Barnard and others questioned the safety of Atkins and similar diets. Also scheduled to speak were Gorran, the parents of a teenage girl who died of cardiac arrest three years ago while on a high-protein, low-fat diet, and the sister of a 41-year-old man who died last June under similar circumstances. Neither had a prior history of heart disease.

The group also presented findings from a web site they started last year to identify people who believe the diet caused health problems. A total of 188 people visited www.atkinsdietalert.org, and constipation, bad breath, and loss of energy were the most frequent complaints. But roughly one in five people listed more serious complaints, such as kidney and heart problems.

Diets high in saturated fat have been linked to an increased risk of diabetes, heart disease, and breast and colon cancers. And high-protein diets have been implicated in kidney problems and some types of cancer.

"Our intention is not to allege cause and effect with this diet in any individual case," Barnard tells WebMD. "But the responses to the web site confirm what we thought we would see. Many people reported serious problems."