Keto Diet and Mental Health: Harvard Expert Reveals Promising Findings

Christopher Palmer, a psychiatrist at Harvard University, has uncovered important results about the impact of the keto diet—which emphasizes high fat intake, moderate protein, and very low carbohydrates—on mental and psychological health. He argues that this diet can help some patients regain control of their mental well-being by directly addressing metabolic disorders in the body.

In 2022, Palmer published his book Brain Energy, where he asserted that the roots of mental illness lie in metabolic dysfunction, not merely imbalances in neurotransmitters. He has been a strong advocate of this perspective ever since.

Palmer, who works at McLean Hospital for psychiatric care near Boston, told UnDark, a science research outlet, that the keto diet has long been used in traditional medicine to treat severe epilepsy. Over recent years, multiple studies have shown that the ketogenic diet not only helps manage epilepsy, bipolar disorder, major depression, and schizophrenia, but also reduces, in some cases, the side effects of antipsychotic medications.

A study published last year in the journal Research Psychiatry by Shibani Sethi, a psychiatrist and obesity specialist at Stanford University, involved 21 adults with schizophrenia or bipolar disorder. All participants had metabolic issues such as weight gain or insulin resistance, and were taking antipsychotic drugs.

Another trial conducted by Georgia Ede, a Harvard-trained psychiatrist, included 31 adults suffering from severe mental illnesses ranging from depression to schizophrenia and bipolar disorder. Despite years of intensive psychiatric care, their conditions remained unstable.

During the French hospital trial, 28 participants were placed on a specialized ketogenic diet for at least two weeks—the minimum time needed to observe results. Remarkably, all participants who adhered to the diet experienced significant improvements in their mental state as well as metabolic health.

By the end of the study:

• 43% of participants saw their core psychiatric symptoms significantly reduced.

• 64% were able to reduce their psychiatric medication doses.