On the fasting track: foregoing food may help our bodies to heal - includes list of resources

He also does not recommend fasting as a way to help with weight loss, explaining that during a fast, the body seeks to conserve energy by slowing down its metabolism. The metabolism becomes more efficient on less food; as a result, the body is "primed" to gain weight if unhealthy eating habits are resumed after the fast. This same "yo-yo" syndrome happens to people who frequently go on and off diets.

However, Goldhamer believes that, if done properly, "fasting can help you lose weight. It's true that if you fast and binge, you can gain all that fat back," he says. "But if you fast and then move on to a healthy diet, there's no yo-yo effect. You can keep the weight off."

Schmid believes that fasting is most useful for non-debilitating illnesses. "While a fast helps cleanse the body, nutrients must be provided," he says. "The elimination of harmful foods allows the body a rest, and extended periods of fasting may achieve good results." But, he says, "consistent recovery from chronic disease, with much less discomfort to the patient," is easily obtained through good nutrition.

GETTING THE WORD OUT

To understand the scientific evidence surrounding fasting, Goldhamer has compiled a bibliography of 1,100 English-language human studies on fasting. He states that many of the studies are physiological (they describe the bodily reactions that occur during fasting) rather than clinical (they don't study how a fast heals a specific illness).

One study that documented a clinical use of fasting appeared in Clinical Ecology (Vol. II, No. 3, Summer 1984). The article, "Fasting & rheumatoid arthritis: A multicenter study" by George F. Kroker, M.D., et al, looked at 43 patients with classic rheumatoid arthritis symptoms. The patients went on a six-day water fast in a controlled, supervised environment. Patients were monitored for major symptoms of arthritis, using standard measuring methods. The symptoms measured included tenderness, swelling, grip strength, pain, functional activity and joint mobility. According to the study results, all of the patients significantly improved in all areas during the fast.

Although studies like this are encouraging, all the practitioners interviewed agree that more human studies are needed. Sabatino says there is still a stigma associated with fasting among members of the medical community. "I'll meet doctors who will talk badly about fasting, and invariably, none of them will have ever observed a clinically supervised fast. But they all have an opinion on it." Sabatino thinks true change will come only when fasting gets into popular literature and out in the public. Most people, he says, still associate fasting with the single-minded protesters or prisoners who occasionally make the news while on hunger strikes.

For this image to change, interested doctors and health practitioners need to publish their clinical studies. Those studies, of course, take money. Fasting cannot promote a new pharmaceutical product, so it won't pull in big research dollars. Still, with the increasing attention being paid to health care costs and a gradual awareness of the importance of preventive health care, fasting may inch its way into public awareness as one alternative health option.