Video: How to Use Chewing Gum to Lose Weight

The ingredient in chewing gum that makes people loose weight is sorbital, which acts as a laxative to some individuals. Learn more about chewing gum to loose weight with tips from an licensed dietitian in this free video on eating healthy.

Video Transcript

My name is Christine Marquette and I'm a registered dietitian with the Austin Regional Clinic and I'm going to talk to you about how to lose weight with chewing gum. Now how this all came about where there were actually a few cases of some patients in different parts of the country and actually different parts of the world for that matter who started having significant unexplained diarrhea where they were losing massive amounts of weight and initially their medical providers couldn't figure out what was going on and then they found out they were chewing an excess of 14 sticks of gum that had sorbital in it. Sorbital is a sugared alcohol that is known to have a laxative effect and in some people that are very sensitive it can be an extreme laxative effect. Someone who is chewing that much gum it definitely would cause severe bouts of diarrhea so that is the first published case of people losing weight from people chewing gum. Again this was not a good healthy way to lose weight so now some of the reasonings of using chewing gum to lose weight are some people think that if you chew a piece of gum you will be less likely to snack on the high fat or high calorie items. There may be some benefit to that say for example if during the holidays you are doing a lot of baking for friends and family, most people if they are baking or they are cooking a lot they will tend to nibble on things as they are preparing their food. So in that case it may help a little bit, you can chew on a piece of gum. If you have that gum in your mouth you can't really eat the cookie or nibble on whatever you are preparing at the same time so from that perspective it can save you a few calories. It may also help during the day if you for example have the munchies and you are wanting to snack on foods and the only thing that is available are potato chips out of the vending machines. At that point sharing a piece of gum may distract you for a bit of time until you can actually choose a healthier option. So it can help slightly but it is not going to be a miracle weight loss aid. It is just something that ma help replace some calories because a stick of chewing gum if it is regular gum it is going to have probably less than 10 calories so it is a low calorie option as opposed to eating a bag of chips but in and of itself chewing gum isn't going to make you lose weight.

How to Use Chewing Gum to Lose Weight

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