You Are What You Eat star agrees to drop 'Dr'

Gillian McKeith, the television nutritionist, has agreed to drop the title Dr from her company's advertising following a complaint to the industry watchdog.

She has attracted controversy over the use of the title, which is not a medical qualification.

The presenter of the Channel 4 programme You Are What You Eat has made millions from book and health food spin-offs in which she has been described as Dr McKeith.

Read more... • 'Dr' Gillian is banned from selling sex aid potions

• Cabin girl in hiding 'after liaison with Fiennes on a flight'

• Drugs? My past stays private says Cameron

Sign up for the latest news alerts

The Advertising Standards Authority received a complaint asking whether the nutritionist was a qualified and accredited doctor and therefore entitled to use the title.

After the ASA came to the provisional conclusion that the title was likely to mislead the public, McKeith Research said it would stop using it in advertising for future products.

Previously the nutritionist had argued that she had a right to call to call herself a doctor after completing a distance-learning PhD in holistic nutrition from the American Holistic College of Nutrition.

It is understood that the basis of the complaint to the ASA was that the title could be misleading to the public because the college had not been accredited by a recognised educational authority when she took the course.

McKeith has now agreed not to call herself a doctor on advertising for her company or its products, which include a range of health foods and cookbooks, removing the need for a full investigation.

McKeith is best known for presenting You Are What You Eat, in which she helps to motivate members of the public to lose weight and change their lifestyle.

The programme is currently in its fourth series and is following the progress of two people who have been chosen to move into her London home and stick to a healthy living regime.

Such is her popularity that she has topped the non-fiction list in public libraries.

Three months ago, however, she was censured by the Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency for illegally selling a range of herbal sex pills called Fast Formula Horny Goat Weed Complex.

These were advertised as shown by a 'controlled study' to promote sexual saisfaction, and sold with explicit medicinal claims.

She was ordered to remove the products from sale immediately.

Her PR representative Max Clifford said yesterday that her degree had not played a part in her career.

He said: 'Personally I wish it had never been mentioned.

'She never needed it and it's done nothing but cause her embarrassment.'

Channel 4 described her as a 'clinical nutritionist' when her series started, but her work has been criticised by academics and researchers specialising in human nutrition. They argue that her approach of lambasting people for eating the 'wrong diet' and using fear to get them to improve their dietary habits does not help change behaviour in the long term.

As part of that approach, she has reduced fat people to tears on her TV programmes.

The British Dietetic Association last year issued a warning that people were making themselves ill by following the advice of untrained and unqualified diet doctors.