Interesting Article on Atkins!

Interesting article on Atkins:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/4230348/

I guess Atkins may be too good to be true!

Didn't bloomberg make a comment that atkins' wife got pissed about relatuing to this? Go figure, he tells the world how to lose weight while he dies ferom heart disease

Plus, I doubt it is normal for someone to die weeks later from a bonk on the head.

His wife was saying he had heart problems before the fall...doesn't strengthen his ideas though.

I never believed in the diet anyway - it's a quick fix at best.

Interestingly enough, my dad, who has heart issues, is only an inch or two shorter than Atkins was, and weighs Eight Pounds LESS.

My Dad's a heavy guy - I've only recently been able to reach my arms around him when hugging him.

I can't imagine how big Atkins must have been.

I agree that there are much healthier ways to loose weight.

It looks like he never exercised a day in his life!

JMO here but since I work for Atkins I feel I have to speak up,
DR Atkins DID have a caridomypathy almost a year before his passing. He had an infection which was attacking his heart muscles and thus he had a heart attack.
Dr. Atkins DID slip and fall on an ice patch last April and had major head trauma. His medical records prove that. Dr. Atkins WAS in a coma after his fall and after an attempt to stop bleeding in his brain, Mrs. Atkins decide to to take him off life support.
Dr. Atkins was in his early 70's when he passed.
Having know DR. Atkins and having worked for him and his company for the past 5 years it makes me very angry to hear people say hurtful and un true things about him.
Even though he is a controvosial (sp?) dr. he was still a person and so is his wife. They both deserve privacy and respect especially his wife who is still dealing with a loss of her husband.
Don't mean to anger anyone or anything, this is just my opinion.

Statement by Stuart Trager, M.D., Chair, Atkins Physicians Council on February 10, 2004 Report on Dr. Atkins Weight at the Time of his Death

NEW YORK, Feb. 10 /PRNewswire/ -- Today's Wall Street Journal ran a story on the health of Dr. Robert Atkins and grossly distorted and inaccurately reported information that Dr. Atkins was obese at the time of his death. In fact, up until the time he became comatose and lay in the hospital for two weeks. Dr. Atkins' average weight was actually 60 pounds less than reported in the Journal. The newspaper article was based on incomplete personal medical records that were illegally delivered to the newspaper in violation of federal law, coming from a known group of Vegan and animal rights extremists.

Dr. Atkins' weight was consistently and frequently documented in the years and months prior to his fall; as he was suffering from cardiomyopathy, his health was monitored closely. Due to water retention, this robust 6-foot plus man, who competitively played tennis frequently during the week, had a weight that varied between 180 and 195. During his coma, as he deteriorated and his major organs failed, fluid retention and bloating dramatically distorted his body and left him at 258 pounds at the time of his death, a documented weight gain of over 60 pounds. How and why the Journal reported that he was obese, remains the only unanswered question in this pathetic situation.

Any implication that Dr. Atkins was obese or fat prior to his coma, shows a blatant disregard or even worse, lack of understanding of the medical facts surrounding this case, or of the physiology of severe heart failure and the degree of fluid retention that occurred during this hospitalization. None of us would expect the physicians at PCRM to reveal this in light of their past and their current motivation ... but surely as physicians they understood that this was not obesity, I guess it just didn't support the point they cared to convey ... so they chose to ignore it?

Source: Stuart Trager, M.D.

i have to say i agree that it is not nice to talk about someone badly after they've died (unless of course, someone like hitler)
atkins diet isnt' for everyone and i find it to be rather unhealthy personally, but i cant' say it's fair to say hurtful things about a man who died unexpectedly who still has a family to read these sort of things. JMO

Whoever released the info broke the law and should be punished. And I never said anything bad about the man - for Pete's sake, he changed the way we think about food!

But I still hold the right to my beliefs that this diet has some very bad and some good to it.

The good - cut out all the candy and the low-nutritional value foods. The bad - the bad fats and the belief that there is a magic bullet.

I know people that have been sick and/or gained weight on this diet because they followed the book without seeking the guidance of a medical professional.

I still also think that someone healthy should have been able to handle any of those things that happened to him, a virus, a fall, whatever. I still think that he was not the epitome of health even though his way of life made him above avearge.

There is no easy way to lose weight and be healthy. Society has to change focus before we do that. It is too bad this happened to him. He had everyone's attention and could have changed society on other things too...