Why were "starvation diets" promoted for diabetes in the pre-insulin period?

<p>Abstract</p> <p>In the decade before the discovery of insulin, the prominent American physicians Frederick Allen and Elliott Joslin advocated severe fasting and undernutrition to prolong the lives of diabetic patients. Detractors called this "starvation dieting," and s...

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Main Author: Mazur Allan
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: BMC 2011-03-01
Series:Nutrition Journal
Online Access:http://www.nutritionj.com/content/10/1/23
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spelling doaj-3802889787a945ea97961491227f605e2020-11-24T22:57:24ZengBMCNutrition Journal1475-28912011-03-011012310.1186/1475-2891-10-23Why were "starvation diets" promoted for diabetes in the pre-insulin period?Mazur Allan<p>Abstract</p> <p>In the decade before the discovery of insulin, the prominent American physicians Frederick Allen and Elliott Joslin advocated severe fasting and undernutrition to prolong the lives of diabetic patients. Detractors called this "starvation dieting," and some patients did indeed starve to death. Allen and Joslin promoted the therapy as a desperate application of animal experimentation to clinical treatment, and texts still describe it that way. This justification was exaggerated. The public record contains only the briefest account of relevant animal experiments, and clinical experience at the time provided little indication that severe undernutrition had better outcomes than low carbohydrate diets then in use.</p> http://www.nutritionj.com/content/10/1/23
collection DOAJ
language English
format Article
sources DOAJ
author Mazur Allan
spellingShingle Mazur Allan
Why were "starvation diets" promoted for diabetes in the pre-insulin period?
Nutrition Journal
author_facet Mazur Allan
author_sort Mazur Allan
title Why were "starvation diets" promoted for diabetes in the pre-insulin period?
title_short Why were "starvation diets" promoted for diabetes in the pre-insulin period?
title_full Why were "starvation diets" promoted for diabetes in the pre-insulin period?
title_fullStr Why were "starvation diets" promoted for diabetes in the pre-insulin period?
title_full_unstemmed Why were "starvation diets" promoted for diabetes in the pre-insulin period?
title_sort why were "starvation diets" promoted for diabetes in the pre-insulin period?
publisher BMC
series Nutrition Journal
issn 1475-2891
publishDate 2011-03-01
description <p>Abstract</p> <p>In the decade before the discovery of insulin, the prominent American physicians Frederick Allen and Elliott Joslin advocated severe fasting and undernutrition to prolong the lives of diabetic patients. Detractors called this "starvation dieting," and some patients did indeed starve to death. Allen and Joslin promoted the therapy as a desperate application of animal experimentation to clinical treatment, and texts still describe it that way. This justification was exaggerated. The public record contains only the briefest account of relevant animal experiments, and clinical experience at the time provided little indication that severe undernutrition had better outcomes than low carbohydrate diets then in use.</p>
url http://www.nutritionj.com/content/10/1/23
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