Understanding the
Ketone Dose
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Measuring your ketones is a great way to track your progress whether you’re fasting or following a low carb diet. Learning which foods and exercises increase or decrease your depth of ketosis is an enlightening and often surprising experience.
But what if you’re looking for a simple, boiled down answer to the question: how did I do today?
That’s where the Ketone Dose comes in.
The Ketone Dose is a summary of how long and how deeply you’ve been in ketosis on any given day. This is important because research suggests that a daily Ketone Dose of 120 is associated with a fat loss rate of about 0.5 pounds/week.
The graph below shows the Ketone Dose of one of our clinical trial participants who restarted her low carb lifestyle after a long break. Throughout the first week of the trial, she watched her Ketone Dose rise from 0 to 120 and her weight drop by 4 pounds!
Tracking her score allowed her to see that although she was not yet in ketosis during the first few days of the trial, her numbers were steadily rising. In her post-trial interview, she told us that watching this trend was hugely motivating.
Of course, the benefits of ketosis are not restricted to just weight loss. Other users with high ketone scores reported improved sleep, more stable energy levels, improved mood and stress management, and better athletic performance.
The graphics below correlate different Ketone Doses to possible fat burning and ketosis-related benefits.
How we calculate the Ketone Dose.
Let’s say you’re new to the low carb lifestyle. After your first day tracking, you find that you’ve maintained an ACEs level of 3 for 24 hours. Your Ketone Dose for that day would then be 3 ACEs x 24 hours = 72.
The table to the left relates average ACEs levels over a 24-hour period with their associated Ketone Doses. Note that in order to connect the Dose to a 24-hour period, the calculation takes into account your most recent measurement from the previous day if within 24 hours, as well as your most recent measurement the following day if within 24 hours. You might open your home screen at the end of today to find a Ketone Dose of 85, and then open it tomorrow morning following a measurement and see the Dose change to 100. This ensures that you get a full 24-hour snapshot of your ketone levels.
The key to achieving your health goals is to increase your Ketone Dose over time. One way to do this is to increase your score goal in automatic increments. For example, you may start at a Dose of 50, and every time you reach 50 five times, your goal will advance to 75. When you reach 75 five times, your goal will then advance to 100, and so on, up to a score of 500. You may also choose to set your own Ketone Dose goal at any time by entering your goal on the “Me” screen under “Ketone Dose Goal.”
Research suggests that maintaining a breath acetone level of 5 ACEs (or about 2 ppm) results in an average fat loss rate of about 0.5 pounds/week. A daily average of 5 ACEs corresponds to a Ketone Dose of 120.
For most users, ketone levels vary often substantially throughout the day. For this reason, it is important to take a minimum of 3-5 breath ketone measurements per day to capture that variability. More frequent measurements will make your calculation that much more accurate and meaningful.
