HMR - Health Management Resources Review

The HMR Diet Program is shorthand for its parent company, Health Management Resources. HMR was founded in the early 1980s by Dr. Lawrence Stiller, a behavioral psychologist, to provide weight management programs for the obese. In the early days HMR Diets were medically supervised very low calorie liquid diet/meal replacement plans (500-1200 calories per day), available only in hospitals, clinics and medical centers - but the company has since expanded to include at-home, do-it-yourself programs.

So what is it? HMR offers four basic programs. The original program is the medically supervised Very Low Calorie Diet (VLCD), which is on-site in a treatment facility - serious stuff, for which you will need to be medically approved. It's an intensive 6 week liquid fasting program followed by a 6 week period of HMR low calorie replacement meals. This program is commonly used in hospitals to prep people for bariatric surgery. There is another program called the Healthy Solutions Plan - more moderate, to lose 40 pounds or less - which is not medically supervised and offers more freedom of choice amongst the HMR meal replacement products. A third option is the HMR at Home plan - no stays in a treatment facility but you are medically supervised over the phone. The fourth and final option in the HMR stable of products are the HMR At Home Quick Start Diet Kits - packaged meals, cereals, nutrition bars, shakes and pudding meal replacement products which are delivered to your door.

HMR has been around a long time, and its programs are effective in terms of what they promise. You will lose weight on HMR Diets, but of course these types of programs are not sustainable for the long term, so you'll need to adapt to your life once you're back on solid food in order to keep the weight off. HMR is expensive - $1,000-$2,000 for the medically supervised programs, $100 per week for the Quick Start programs with meals, $90 for two weeks worth of shakes with no meals.