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Pittsburg, Kansas | The term gets thrown around a lot.
A ketogenic diet is a diet which causes a person to be in nutritional ketosis. This is generally considered when blood measured ketones are at a level of either .2 or .5 mm per dl of blood or higher. It is a measurable diet.
Generally levels will run from .2 to maybe as high as 4.0. Some worry (completely without basis) of ketoacidosis but that has to get in the double digit range which is essentially impossible as long as a person has a pancreas making insulin. It can happen to type I diabetics that don't take their or enough insulin. A regular person would need a non functioning pancreatic beta cells to ever have ketoacidosis.
Insulin levels have to be low to be in nutritional ketosis. The way to lower insulin levels is to reduce or eliminate carbohydrates in the diet. Most healthy people can get into nutritional ketosis by reducing the carb count to under 50 grams total per day. A person who is insulin resistant(including type I I diabetics) may require as low as 20 grams total.
That is what a ketogenic diet is. A diet low enough in carbohydrate consumption to get into nutritional ketosis. A low carb diet may or may not be ketogenic so the terms are not interchangeable.
Edited by John Burns 1/30/2024 06:16
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What is keto
