OBESITY RESEARCH Open Journal http://dx.doi.org/10.17140/OROJ-2-112 Obes Res Open J ISSN 2377-8385 Daily Calcium Intervention for a Weight-Loss Program Resulted in More Signifcant Decreases in Body Weight, BMI, Body Fat Mass, and Body Fat Percentage Yen-Ling Chen 1 , Yi-Chun Chen 2 , Jung-Su Chang 2 , Jo Chun Lin 2 and Yi-Wen Chien 2* 1 Department of Internal Medicine, Division of Metabolism and Endocrinology, Shin Kong Wu Ho-Su Memorial Hospital, Taipei, Taiwan, ROC 2 School of Nutrition and Health Sciences, Taipei Medical University, Taipei, Taiwan, ROC * Corresponding author Yi-Wen Chien School of Nutrition and Health Sciences Taipei Medical University 250 Wu-Hsing Street Taipei 110, Taiwan, ROC Tel. 886-2-2736-1661 Fax: 886-2-2737-3112 E-mail: ychien@tmu.edu.tw Article History Received: July 13 th , 2015 Accepted: August 18 th , 2015 Published: August 19 th , 2015 Citation Chen Y-L, Chen Y-C, Chang J-S, Lin JC, Chien Y-W. Daily calcium inter- ventionfor a weight-loss program re- sulted in more signifcant decreases in body weight, BMI, body fat mass, and body fat percentage. Obes Res Open J. 2015; 2(2): 73-80. doi: 10.17140/OROJ-2-112 Copyright ©2015 Chien Y-W. This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (CC BY 4.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. Volume 2 : Issue 2 Article Ref. #: 1000OROJ2112 Research Page 73 ABSTRACT The purpose of this study was to assess of calcium intervention on the effectiveness of a weight-loss program for obese people. All subjects had an initial BMI (body mass index) >24 kg/m 2 and low calcium diet (<500 mg/d). Forty-two healthy overweight or obese people were randomly and equally divided into two groups: a Hi-Ca group (female: 16, male: 5) and a control group (female: 16, male: 5). In the Hi-Ca group, we provided two bottles of Hi-Ca drinks per day and a low energy diet (energy: 1200 kcal, carbohydrate: 55%, fat: 25%, protein: 20%) for eight weeks. In the control group, we only provided the low energy diet for eight weeks. We measured three-day food records, anthropometric and blood biochemical data at Weeks 0 and 8. Calcium intake was 964.5±75.5 mg in the Hi-Ca group and was 353.7±96.6 mg in the control group (p<0.05). After eight weeks, results showed the loss of body weight (-6.9±3.3 kg, p<0.05), BMI (-2.7±1.1 kg/m 2 , p<0.01), body fat mass (-5.7±2.7 kg, p<0.05), body fat percentage (-4.4±1.9 %, p<0.002) and TC/HDL-C (-0.4±0.6, p<0.05) in the Hi-Ca group were signifcantly different from those of the control group at eight weeks. In the lipid profle, serum cholesterol, triglycerides and LDL-C concentration were signifcantly decreased compared with Week 0. The serum PTH (parathyroid hormone) levels in the Hi-Ca group were signifcantly lower compared with baseline (-5.3±10.4 pg/mL, p<0.05), which showed that the concentration of PTH and calcium intake are negatively correlated, and indicate that a high- calcium low-energy diet resulted in more signifcant decreases in body weight, BMI, body fat mass, and body fat percentage. Therefore, a high calcium diet increases the effectiveness of an energy-restricted diet for weight loss in overweight people. KEYWORDS: Obesity; Energy restricted diet; Weight loss; Calcium; Parathyroid hormone (PTH). ABBREVIATIONS: PTH: Parathyroid hormone; CVD: Cardiovascular disease; BMI: Body Mass Index. INTRODUCTION Obesity is recognized as one of the most signifcant public health problems in the world. 1-3 It is a risk factor for chronic disease, such as heart disease, cancer, stroke and diabe- tes. 4-7 Conversely, weight loss is associated with reduction of risk for Cardiovascular disease (CVD) and diabetes mellitus. 4,5,8 To study this relationship, we assessed the impact of a dietary calcium intervention on the effectiveness of a weight loss program for obese people. Recent fndings indicate that calcium metabolism and perhaps other components of dairy products may contribute to shifting the energy balance, and thus play a role in weight reg-