Has anyone tried Ketone Test Strips?

[MintTeaMascara]

I bought some for fun more than anything and out of curiosity last week.

I started doing partial-day fasts and did notice I was in a state of ketosis after 48 hours.

It is interesting to see them measure when my body is burning fat but I think that's inevitable when cutting down calories anyway, with or without the test strips.

Has anyone found them useful, found them to support dieting in any way, or learned how to use them to maximize fat burning? If you have I'd find it interesting to hear how.

Or did you find that they were just another way to confirm "Yes, you are definitely burning fat right now"?

Hope you're all doing good and well.

~ MintTeaMascara ~

[Subtle_badger]

I haven't tried them. I know Hidden has.

I haven't because I have no idea what I would do with the data. One thing I know about them is they show the ketones you are not using. So if the sticks turn purple (or whatever), that means you are producing ketones and burning fat. If they don't turn the right colour, that doesn't mean anything. It could be that you aren't producing ketones, or it could be your body has adapted, and is no longer - ahem - "pissing" them away but using them. A fat adapted body may not excrete any ketones while in ketosis.

Long term, breath or blood ketones are more reliable.

[TheAwfulToad Visitor]

Ketone strips are a bit of psychological prop, but that doesn't mean they're pointless. I used them years ago during my initial low-carb experiments because I was curious to verify that the diet works the way it's supposed to. And it does. After that I stopped using them.

As Subtle_badger explained, it's important to realise they do not tell you that your body is burning fat - and even if they did, that would be useless information. Energy flows in and out of fat storage all the time; what you're actually interested in is the maintenance setpoint for the storage size, not the in-and-out tidal flow.

Ketone strips tell you that you're excreting acetoacetate. That's all they do. And the most likely reason for excreting acetoacetate (in healthy individuals) is that you are not well-adapted to burning fat. During the early phases of "keto" that's fine, because what you're interested in seeing is that dark purple colour fade away towards brown over the next few weeks. That indicates that you're becoming adapted to running on ketones (not precisely the same thing as being fat-adapted, but close enough).

You will not see ketone excretion if you cut calories. Nor will you see fat loss. The reason is that a carb-adapted body will struggle to switch over to efficient fat-burning for short periods. You'll only see it happen under actual starvation conditions, ie., you stop eating for at least 24 hours. The only way to sustain ketosis in a healthy manner is to drastically reduce your carb intake.

Periodic starvation is largely counterproductive if your diet is mostly carbs, because your body will adapt to the starvation condition by lowering its metabolic rate. A poster mentioned in the LCHF forum that Muslims fasting during Ramadan often end up gaining weight.

TL;DR: if you're doing a keto phase, test strips will reassure you that you're doing things right; if you're doing high-carb low-fat calorie-counting plus fasting, they're probably not very useful!

[Hidden]

Yes I used them. They ‘proved’ that I was usually in mild ketosis when I started a LCHF diet. I am not sure how that really helped me lose weight, but it was just mildly amusing. The urine sticks stop showing the ketones after a couple of weeks as the ketosis process changes so fewer ketones pass out in urine. I then also had a blood test for a health check that showed a few ketones & then had a metallic taste in my mouth for a few months. That all used to feel terribly important in the early days. I expect I have other things to worry about now, but equally I know now that my diet is low carb enough.

[MintTeaMascara Healthy BMI]

Okay.. Thanks I hear you and thanks for the responses. It's ashame they're not much more useful.. I guess it is just a bit of amusement and psychological prop.

Thanks for confirming

[MintTeaMascara Healthy BMI]

I started using the strips off the back of watching a dieting program that classified me as a "constant craver" and said that the best diet for me would be to fast 2 days a week.

I have noticed when fasting that the strips show neutral at about 1pm but by 3pm they have turned pink, so it's good for me to see at what point Ketones are showing up.

I might have a go at stretching myself a little further the more I get used to fasting and see if the outcome on the strips change.