Dietwatch.com Review

 

If you're unfamiliar with Dietwatch.com you might be surprised to learn that the company has been around since 1999, offering one of the first comprehensive online diet programs ever to hit the market. But don't let the fact that you may not have heard of them turn you off - consider that, unlike its competitors, Dietwatch chooses not to dump huge dollars into saturation advertising and instead maintains its focus and resources in one area: providing the best products and services to its clients.

How does it work? Dietwatch's diet profile will analyze your information and return to you a personal profile of the calorie, nutrient and vitamin levels you should be maintaining on a daily basis for weight loss and improved health. You'll then choose your style of low-calorie meal plan from one of four categories. The "no restriction" plan is a balanced, "no banned foods" approach. The low-carbohydrate plan is akin to a "Zone" approach, where the max carb intake is (the recommended, healthy) 40%. The "heart-healthy" Mediterranean plan emphasizes healthy fats, omegas, etc. And lastly, there is a lacto-ovo (eggs & mik) vegetarian plan for non-meat eaters. Your chosen diet is then customized to your personal profile, and the plans are flexible for those with special needs. Note that Dietwatch was founded by a registered dietitian, Jennifer May R.D., who is still running the nutritional programs for the company to this day. By all accounts, all four of these diet categories have been painstakingly developed, using the most current nutritional research, to be as sensible, non-faddish and effective as possible.

With the meal plan comes a personalized meal planner (log in your foods and receive analysis and feedback from Dietwatch), personalized shopping lists, a calorie counter, a food diary, diet tips and suggestions, and daily auto-alerts and reminders. Additionally (and an area where Dietwatch separates itself from its competitors), you'll have a nutritional calculator which accesses an incredibly comprehensive nutritional database for its information. The nutritional calculator will give you the full nutritional stats on everything from a glass of soy milk to a chocolate chip cookie. Another unique Dietwatch feature is the vitamins and minerals database, an at-your-fingertips resource to explain the functions and nutritional values of assorted vitamins and nutrients. And lastly there's a dining out survival guide, which features nutritional information for 40-plus chain and fast food restaurants.

But it's not all about the food, so you'll find fitness and emotional wellness plans to complement the eating plan. The fitness plan provides guidance and instruction which concentrates on cardio, strength and flexibility workouts. You'll have an interactive exercise and activity log to record the type and length of your workout, and a calories burned calculator to add up and track the numbers. The emotional wellness plan, which Dietwatch calls, simply, "Feeling Good" (who can argue with that) focuses on motivational support, goal setting, stress management, positive thinking and optimism, and finding peace in addressing body image and emotional eating. There's a (unique to Dietwatch) feature called the "Meditation Room", which serves as a zen-like cyber-retreat - a place where users can read and share multi-media inspirational thoughts and messages. And the thread pulling all of these plans together is the Dietwatch community - which offers access to Q&A's with trained and certified nutrition and fitness experts, member chat rooms, blogs, message boards, the find-a-friend service, a secured messaging system and weekly newsletters and articles of interest.

The Dietwatch online subscription plan offers all of the features we've come to expect - personalized meal plans, exercise plans, tracking tools, calculators, shopping lists, logs, live support from trained nutrition and fitness experts, a community - but they kick it up a notch by offering a number of unique features (above-par analysis and tracking tools, as well as the "Meditation Room") in an interactive platform that cannot be beat for its user-friendliness. The Dietwatch eating plan is focused (a few solid options, rather than a confusing, all over the map mix of them) and is supported by top-flight guidance and counseling from dietitians and fitness trainers certified by the American Dietetic Association and The American Council on Exercise. It's not for nothing that Dietwatch has won numerous industry award over the years, including Forbes' "Best of the Web" on multiple occasions.

Another thumbs up for Dietwatch: cost. The weekly plan is $2.99/week, billed quarterly at $38.87 for 13 weeks, making it by far the least expensive comprehensive weight loss program you will find.