Hello this is Monica Reinagle and I'm here with a little bonus content for nutrition diva listeners because I wanted to respond to an

article that was in the New York Times a couple of weeks ago and really got a lot of attention

but I think may have slightly misrepresented what I see anyway

as the science that they were talking about.

So this article highlighted the International PCOS Network's revised guidelines

on managing Polysistic Overy Syndrome or PCOS.

Women's Health reporter Alicia Harandasany Gupta wrote,

Researchers now say that there is no solid evidence to suggest that a restrictive diet

in the long term has any significant impact on PCOS symptoms.

Okay, fair enough.

I'm not a fan of restrictive dieting either.

And it is true that the research does not support the superiority or the necessity of a specific

dietary approach such as a low-carb diet for the treatment of PCOS. My issue here is that this Times article seemed to

suggest that pursuing weight loss is no longer recommended for PCOS patients who have overweight or obesity.

In that article there's a registered dietician who specializes in PCOS care

quoted as saying, the link between sustained weight loss and improved symptoms

is not very clear or well established.

And she's right that we don't have much data on the long-term impact of weight loss on PCOS.

But you know what? Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.

Scientific review conducted in 2021 found that weight loss is associated

with improved metabolic, endocrine, reproductive, cardiovascular, and psychological features in women with PCOS.

So I think it's a bit premature to conclude that weight management has no role to play in the treatment of PCOS.

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