A CASE SERIES ON COMBINING MODIFIED MEDITERRANEAN DIET AND KETOGENIC DIET IN A “SANDWICH” APPROACH FOR PATIENTS WITH LIPEDEMA AND COMORBIDITIES

The Ketogenic Diet (KD) is currently the most widely studied nutritional approach for patients with lipedema, although its use may cause important drawbacks especially in case of comorbidities. A Modified Mediterranean Diet (MMed) is more easily adaptable, better tolerated, and can be temporarily replaced by a ketogenic diet for a short period of time if necessary using a sort of "sandwich" approach. We report 10 clinical cases with lipedema and comorbidities subjected to a hypocaloric MMed for 6 months. All patients were properly assessed by anthropometric measurements and body composition before and at the end of nutritional treatment. Only 2 patients needed a short period of KD due to poor response to MMed. At the end of 6-month follow-up, patients showed weight loss with reduction in body circumferences and improvement in body composition. In the two cases where it was necessary to resort to a period of KD, good results were achieved allowing a return to the MMed for the maintenance. In patients suffering from lipedema with associated comorbidities and concomitant pharmacological treatments, the use of MMed as first line treatment allows achievement of better metabolic balance, greater compliance, and improved body composition.