UCLA Health is set to begin a multi-site pilot study to explore whether a ketogenic diet, when combined with mood-stabilising medications, helps stabilise mood symptoms in teenagers and young adults who have bipolar disorder.

Preliminary research on the effects of a ketogenic diet in people with bipolar disorder have shown improvements in mood and in overall executive function, but these open trials have been limited to adults. This will be the first study conducted on the diet’s effects among youth and young adults with bipolar disorder.

Set to begin in March, the 16-week pilot study will recruit adolescents and young adults ages 12-21 with bipolar 1, bipolar 2 or unspecified bipolar disorders. The roughly 40 participants will go on a 16-week ketogenic diet while continuing their standard mood-stabilising medications. Independent evaluators will assess participants each month for depression, mania, anxiety, psychosis, psychosocial functioning and quality of life. Additionally, participants will provide daily blood samples to measure metabolic indicators. The partnering researchers will be providing the food to participants at no charge. All participants will work with registered dietitians, psychiatrists and psychologists affiliated with the study.

In addition to determining whether the diet will stabilise participants’ moods, the pilot trial will also test whether teenagers and young adults actually stick to the diet.

“We want to show that it is feasible first. Before you test a treatment in a randomised trial, you want to know if people will do it and is there a signal for its effectiveness,” said Dr. David Miklowitz, distinguished professor of psychiatry in the Division of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry at the UCLA Semel Institute for Neuroscience and Human Behavior.

Miklowitz said that if the pilot study shows the diet to be feasible in young people with bipolar disorder, further research would be needed to test the effects of the ketogenic therapy against a comparison treatment, such as a strictly Mediterranean diet.

UCLA Health will serve as the coordinating research site, with the other participating sites including the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center, the University of Cincinnati School of Medicine and the University of Colorado. The study is being funded by the Baszucki Family Foundation.