Ketosticks do not work for my hubby. He has tried avoiding coffee for 3 days but the Ketosticks just don't work for him. He's very strict with the diet and he does lose the weight. I know he should not worry but he gets a little frustrated not being able to test himself.

It was explained in the 72 book but I was wondering if there has been any new info regarding this.

No new information that I'm aware of:

"I'm following Induction strictly; why won't my strips turn purple?

Ketones will spill into the urine ONLY when there is more in the blood than is being used as fuel by the body at that particular moment.

You may have exercised or worked a few hours previously, so your muscles would have used up the ketones as fuel, thus there will be no excess. You may have had a lot of liquids to drink, so the urine is more diluted. Perhaps the strips are not fresh, or the lid was not on tight and some moisture from the atmosphere got in.

Some low carbers NEVER show above trace or negative even ... yet they burn fat and lose weight just fine. If you're losing weight, and your clothes are getting looser, you're feeling well and not hungry all the time .. then you are successfully in ketosis. Don't get hung up on the strips; they're just a guide, nothing more.


Will I lose weight faster if the strips show dark purple all the time?

No. Testing in the darkest purple range all the time is usually a sign of dehydration -- the urine is too concentrated. You need to drink more water to dilute it, and keep the kidneys flushed.

The liver will make ketones from body fat, the fat you EAT, and from alcohol --- the ketone strips have no way of distinguishing the source of the ketones. So, if you test every day after dinner, and dinner usually contains a lot of fat, then you may very well test for large amounts of ketones all the time. However this does not indicate that any BODY fat was burned.

The strips only indicate what's happening in the urine. Ketosis happens in the blood and body tissues. If you're showing even a small amount, then you are in ketosis, and fat-burning is taking place. Don't get hung up on the ketone sticks."

http://www.lowcarb.ca/tips/tips011.html

Here's an article on the "sticks" and ketosis you might find interesting:

The color of the stick shows how concentrated the ketones are in your urine. So, if you drink lots of water, the stick will be light, and if you don't drink, it will be dark.

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This is not the way ketosis works, but is a myth that continues to be perpetuated because it logically sounds like it should be true. Ketones are only present in the urine if there are excess ketones in the bloodstream, and then these excess ketones "spill over" into the urine. This can happen at various times during the day. Your level of blood ketosis fluctuates all day long depending on what you eat, and there may or may not be an excess amount to spill into the urine at any given time. The amount of ketones is not static in either the bloodstream or the urine, and their presence in the urine is simply excess that spill over once the blood ketosis level reaches a certain level. A dark reading indicates nothing more than the fact that the bloodstream happened to contain a lot of ketones at that moment, and spilled a lot of them into the urine at that moment. This is why even if you read negative at certain times during the day it doesn't mean you are out of ketosis, it just means that your bloodstream isn't making excess ketones at that moment. You don't go in and out of ketosis all day depending on your stick reading, even though you can test positive at one point, and ten minutes later be negative, or vice versa.

It's also important to know this -- even though the stick is dark and reads "large," this does not indicate a "large" amount of ketones for our healthy kidneys to handle. Don't be scare by that "large" label. Don't forget, these sticks were originally made for diabetics, not dieters, and a "large" reading to them indicates something completely different than it does for us dieters. In general, these stix are also meant for screening purposes and not to make any definitive diagnoses. If a stick turns up a positive reading of any kind, it's a signal for a doctor to do further testing.

Drink lots of water, yes, as this diet is a diuretic and you need to replace fluids...but don't do it simply to change your ketostix color from dark purple.

--Nancy Eaton (who formerly was a clinical consultant for Ames, which is now Bayer, who makes Ketostix and many other kinds of diagnostic test strips and equipment).

living_healthy & sjm,

Thank you very much for the clarification on ketosis and Ketostix! I appreciate it very much.

Hi Living Healthy & sjm

Thanks so much for the info on ketosis – that was very interesting and helpful. My DH just has to accept that he is one of those who does not show ketosis – but he sure is losing the pounds.

I would be interested to hear if anyone else had the same problem – that their ketostix just never turn purple.

Thanks again for taking the time out to answer my question.

Mine never once turned purple.

Didn't keep me from achieving (and maintaining) my goals.