Comment
This randomised placebo-controlled trial demonstrated that
treatment with chitosan combined with lifestyle and dietary
advice produced marginally greater weight loss than advice
alone in overweight and obese individuals. However, the
mean difference between groups in weight loss of just over
half a kilogram achieved over the 24-week study period
cannot be considered to be of great clinical significance.
Treatment with chitosan also led to improvements in some
risk factors associated with obesity, including fasting TC,
LDL-C and glucose levels, although these were also too
small to be considered to be of clinical importance. In
addition to our main analyses, a number of sensitivity
analyses were performed, all of which gave similar results to
the main analyses.