Authors Retract Green Coffee Bean Diet Paper Touted by Dr. Oz

According to Retraction Watch report, two authors of a 2012 paper cited on The Dr. Oz Show, which made claims about green coffee bean extract’s abilities to help people lose weight, have retracted it.

The study’s sponsors,  Joe Vinson and Bryan Burnham, cannot assure the validity of the data so so they are retracting the paper, reported Retraction Watch, noting the study was cited by The Dr. Oz Show, and last month it cost the company a $3.5 million settlement with the Feds.

The paper was originally published in Diabetes, Metabolic Syndrome and Obesity: Targets and Therapy.

The Federal Trade Commission official complaint charged that the study’s lead investigator repeatedly altered the weights and other key measurements of the subjects, changed the length of the trial, and misstated which subjects were taking the placebo or GCA during the trial.

Retraction Watch reported that when the lead investigator was unable to get the study published, the FTC said that AFS hired researchers Joe Vinson and Bryan Burnham at the University of Scranton to rewrite it. Despite receiving conflicting data, Vinson, Burnham, and AFS never verified the authenticity of the information used in the study.

“Despite the study’s flaws, AFS used it to falsely claim that GCA caused consumers to lose 17.7 pounds, 10.5 percent of body weight, and 16 percent of body fat with or without diet and exercise, in 22 weeks,” the complaint alleges.

“Although AFS played no part in featuring its study on The Dr. Oz Show, it took advantage of the publicity afterwards by issuing a press release highlighting the show. The release claimed that study subjects lost weight ‘without diet or exercise,’ even though subjects in the study were instructed to restrict their diet and increase their exercise,” the FTC contends.

For more information, visit www.reactionwatch.com or www.ftc.gov.