Is cinnamon a miracle cure?

May 28, 2011 8:37 PM

Has anybody seen credible evidence that cinnamon capsules are a weight loss miracle?

I've tried Google Scholor, NIH, Snopes, the local library, and a plethora of other online sources that ostensibly are not commercially oriented, and have found nothing that supports the weight loss my friends have achieved with this. I am aware of curing (in part) and stabilizing blood sugar in diabetics, and am presuming it has something to do with being an appetite killer became of this regulatory process on an organic level. I am asking for any real, viable sources for corroborating this new urban myth. Any suggestions?

posted by ~Sushma~ to Health & Fitness (19 answers total)

Correlation doesn't prove causation. Just because your friend lost weight whil eating cinnamon doesn't mean the cinnamon caused the weight loss.

Possibly you haven't found any scientific evidence to back this up because the connection between these two things--weight loss and cinnamon--is coincidental.
posted by dfriedman at 8:47 PM on May 28, 2011 [2 favorites]

Has anybody seen credible evidence that cinnamon capsules are a weight loss miracle?

No.
posted by DarlingBri at 8:48 PM on May 28, 2011 [6 favorites]

How much weight did they have before and after? Some people are so hugely unhealthy that even cutting soda out of their diet can lead to significant weight loss. If they started big, then it may not be the pill but rather accompanying changes in lifestyle
posted by wooh at 8:53 PM on May 28, 2011

Yup, nope. They unfortunately can't do much to your metabolic activity.
posted by sunnychef88 at 9:49 PM on May 28, 2011

There's no such thing as miracles. If such a commonly used substance did work, don't you think people would know about it by now?

Of course, you'll hear from such "medical experts" like Kevin Trudeau who, when hawking similar, "miracles" that THEY don't want you to know about this stuff because THEY want to sell you things that are more expensive. Bull. It's just a way for them to get out of offering any proof.
posted by inturnaround at 11:47 PM on May 28, 2011 [1 favorite]

Best answer: I think what happens is that people want the new treatment to work, (concept of "face" and "saving face") so change their behaviour because they want the tablet to work. I mean, they want the weight loss, but that's kind of nebulous and not concrete. However, the pill working is a concrete concept ("the pill can handle the nebulous weight loss stuff, I just have to focus on the pill.")

Then, when you are taking the pill, you think: "oh, musn't have that soda, because I want the cinnamon pill to work." "Oh, I'll take the stairs, because I want the pill to work."

And voilà you have "cinnamon pills ultimate weight loss tablet! 100% success!" headlines.
posted by titanium_geek at 1:01 AM on May 29, 2011 [2 favorites]

Can you buy them in a chemist / drug store with a label that makes health claims that can only be made under legislation? Do you know any doctors prescribing them? Because if they made you lose weight, that's where they'd be, and that's how you'd get them.
posted by obiwanwasabi at 1:16 AM on May 29, 2011

Tim Ferriss (The Four Hour Body) claims "there is ample evidence that cinnamon can be used to reduce the glycemic index of a meal up to 29%." And the bigger the glycemic response, the more likely your body is to store "excess" calories as fat. Ferriss, despite his hyperbolic writing style, doesn't claim cinnamon is a "weight loss miracle" but actually suggests using it as a way of mitigating fat gain during cheat days. Note: I'm not advocating, just reporting. Also note: Ferriss says there are active ingredients in cinnamon that are harmful in high doses.
posted by zanni at 2:28 AM on May 29, 2011 [1 favorite]

Best answer: Did Tim list any sources? Here's a study from the Netherlands showing that it has no effect for people w/ type 2 diabetes: http://jn.nutrition.org/content/136/4/977.full
posted by reddot at 5:09 AM on May 29, 2011

Dude. Cinnamon is available in large quantities everywhere. Yet there are fat people walking around everywhere too. Anyone trying to convince you that there's a simple way to lose weight easily, by using pseudo-scientific jargon (appetite killer by affecting a regulatory process on an organic level .. really?) is banking on the fact that most people are lazy and ignorant and would rather place their faith and $$$ in a magic bullet fix than try to lose weight in the ONLY method ever proven to work: take in fewer calories than you burn off.

And this: I am aware of curing (in part) and stabilizing blood sugar in diabetics, well, a close friend who is a Type 1 diabetic and struggles hugely to keep his blood sugar under control with an insulin pump would thrilled to know about this cure.
posted by Kangaroo at 5:33 AM on May 29, 2011 [2 favorites]

reddot: Tim does not cite any sources other than self-experimentation with a blood glucose monitor. However, the paper you link to does mention several other papers that have found a positive effect from cinnamon, with numbers similar to the Tim's 29%, so I suspect he's referring to them. FWIW, I don't find the idea implausible. Of course it's still a huge leap from "some positive effect" to "miracle cure."
posted by zanni at 5:53 AM on May 29, 2011 [1 favorite]

There is no credible evidence, not least because there are no weight loss "miracles". Adjustments to energy intake and energy expenditure. That's it. That's how you alter your weight. Everything else is snake oil and waffle.
posted by Decani at 7:06 AM on May 29, 2011

Placebo effect.

Also, stuff like this is not regulated by the FDA so there is really no way to know exactly what's in it...it may not actually be cinnamon.
posted by radioamy at 7:27 AM on May 29, 2011

Re: Tim Ferris, I believe he also said that these benefits are ONLY seen from using raw, fresh cinnamon. So even if there are weight loss benefits, pill form wouldn't be effective according to him.
posted by JMB1138 at 9:05 AM on May 29, 2011

Best answer: "Effect of cinnamon on postprandial blood glucose, gastric emptying, and satiety in healthy subjects" is one of the papers listed in the article reddot cited. It's a small study showing a significant difference in blood glucose concentration following the consumption of 300g of rice pudding when 6g of cinnamon was added.

While that isn't a weight loss miracle, it seems like a good thing.
posted by Snerd at 9:58 AM on May 29, 2011 [1 favorite]

Response by poster: Thank you for the answers, MeFi's. The studies indicated above are sufficient evidence for me. For the record, I have not bought into this at all, and am trying to debunk this theory. Having said that, among my community, four subjects have claimed an average weight loss of 7 lbs, which is statistically insignificant, and indeed could be the placebo effect..
posted by ~Sushma~ at 12:51 PM on May 29, 2011

Just took a look at the study above. It included 14 people with a mean age of 25 years and mean BMI 22.6 ie very small sample size in the healthy young. Interesting that they report a statistically significant difference between the two groups in terms of gastric emptying rate (GER) when the two (median) values are 37% and 34.5%. So yes, cinnamon causes the stomach to empty 2.5% faster than no cinnamon. It's statistically significant, but is it clinically significant ie is a difference of this magnitude large enough to matter?
posted by lulu68 at 3:30 PM on May 29, 2011

Response by poster: Excellent question, lulu68. I also wonder that the habits of the women in my community may play a part in skewing the results. One of the studies cited above is of post menopausal women, some of them (my group) that lost the mean weight were not. They all drink alcohol, two are alcoholics, and they all are heavy smokers and in their 50's. The wife of one of them said that her husband's use of insulin in managing his diabetes was substantially reduced. Many, if not all of their issues could have been solved had they just quit their bad habits, but then again IANAD, just a simple country gal.
posted by ~Sushma~ at 6:27 PM on May 29, 2011

Weight loss is accomplished purely through creating a caloric deficit - always. Any pill which claims to be "the answer" is hogwash. Though I will say this: the placebo effect can be extremely powerful in certain people, and if they hold a strong belief in the claims of the appetite suppression, it can work.
posted by Evernix at 10:05 PM on May 29, 2011