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If you’re like most of my friends in the popular Weight Watchers diet program, you’ve memorized the point count for every food you eat. But now you’re going to have to start over.

For the uninitiated, Weight Watchers assigns points for every portion of every food you eat.  One of the things that makes the diet program so popular is that you can eat anything you like — as long as you don’t exceed your allocated number of points. Weight Watchers has modified the program a bit, to encourage dieters to spend their points on healthier and less calorie-dense foods.

Now the program is getting a major change.  The new ProPoints system has been very popular in central Europe, where it was given a trial launch last year.  On  Friday Nov. 12 and Wednesday Nov. 17  (news so good it can’t be given all at once?) Weight Watchers is telling health reporters to gear up for a major announcement.  That announcement, already made at a stock analyst’s meeting in February, is that Weight Watchers is going to launch ProPoints in North America.

So what are ProPoints?  According to what the company is telling UK reporters, it tells you “the amount of energy that is available in food after you’ve eaten it.”  The system calculates points based on an individual’s sex, age, weight, and height.  Calculators already available as smartphone apps will calculate ProPoints for you once you’ve input these factors along with the weight and specific type of food you’d like to eat.

Food manufacturers who feature Weight Watcher points on package labels are expected to start listing the foods new ProPoint values.

Weight Watchers says the change is needed because new scientific knowledge about energy balance has made the old system outdated.  At news conferences for the financial press, WeightWatchers executive say the ProPoints program has been increasing business.  They hope the same will happen in the U.S., where business has been flagging.

WebMD has analyzed the Weight Watchers program and has found it to be among the most effective systems for losing weight.  It is a successful combination of watching what you eat,  avoiding hunger, emphasizing healthy eating, increasing exercise, and — a crucial ingredient — community support.

It remains to be seen whether the new point system will catch on with  North American weight watchers. But if blogs from Europe are any indication, the new system is likely to become quite popular — even if all my friends will have to learn a new point system.

Source:  Daniel J. DeNoon, Senior Medical Writer, WebMD

Ben Pierzina of Onalaska, Wisconsin, has lost 100 pounds in six months by following Dr. Siegal’s Cookie Diet, the popular weight-loss regimen created by renowned physician, author, and weight-loss expert Sanford Siegal, D.O., M.D., in 1975.  Beginning at 280 pounds, Pierzina is now a svelte 180 pounds and says he looks and feels like a new man.

“I’ve treated more than 500,000 overweight patients during the past fifty years and have had more dramatic success stories than I can possibly count, yet I never get tired of hearing stories such as Benny’s,” said Dr. Siegal. “Seven times over the past six months, he has posted updates of his progress in the Fan Mail section of CookieDiet.com (www.CookieDiet.com/testimonials), and after each one I’ve found myself eagerly anticipating the next one.”

Dr. Siegal’s weight-loss success stories have been chronicled over the years in more than 100 major media outlets including Good Morning America, Today Show, Entertainment Tonight, The New York Times, and Fox News. Some, like New York Jets star linebacker Kris Jenkins, have been celebrities and Dr. Siegal’s own patients. Most, however, have been everyday people who overcame obesity by following Dr. Siegal’s plan under their own doctor’s supervision.

“I saw my doctor near the start of my diet and told him what I was planning to do, and he was very encouraging,” said Pierzina. “Obviously, he was anxious for me to lose the weight as soon as possible.”

Sanford Siegal, D.O., M.D., is a practicing physician based in Miami who has achieved notoriety for books on topics such as high fiber diets, controlling hunger without drugs, and hypothyroidism. But he’s best known as “The Cookie Doctor” behind the popular Dr. Siegal’s Cookie Diet weight-loss system. Dr. Siegal’s latest book, which will be in general release in January, is The Cookie Doctor Cookbook: Countless Combinations of Delicious Meals for Any Calorie-Controlled Lifestyle (2011, Egg & Dart/Dynamic Housewares, ISBN 978-0-9841887-6-5).

On Dr. Siegal’s program, dieters consume 1,000 to 1,200 calories a day, and the typical weight-loss is about 10 pounds per month.

Dr. Siegal conceived the idea of a diet based on a hunger-controlling cookie in the early 1970s while writing a book about natural food substances that are particularly effective at satisfying hunger. After a number of years of experimentation, Dr. Siegal developed a formula for a particular mixture of amino acids that resulted from combining certain food substances. He baked his fla into a cookie and tried it with a few patients. Dr. Siegal’s Cookie Diet was an immediate success. Soon, his South Florida medical practice had expanded to include 14 clinics.

Hundreds of other physicians have used Dr. Siegal’s Cookie Diet in their own practices.

“I’ve used Dr. Siegal’s Cookie Diet for years in my New York City medical practice, and the results have been excellent,” said weight-loss expert and bestselling author Dr. Howard Shapiro.  “Coincidentally, a patient of mine who I’ve had on Dr. Siegal’s program for about six months also reached the 100 pound weight-loss mark last week. He’s a well-known media personality who has been chronicling his progress for his audience since his diet began.”

Dr. Shapiro recently appeared on Good Morning America to discuss his latest book, Eat and Beat Diabetes with Picture Perfect Weight Loss.

Source: PR Newswire