Medical Weight Loss News

Carrying extra weight is always dangerous to your health, even if the amount of excess weight is small. When an individual gains enough weight to be considered obese, the problem becomes even more serious. Unfortunately, this condition is much more widespread than many people realize. In fact, according to data published by the Centers for Disease Control, more than one-third of all adults living in the United States are currently obese. [Read more]

I am thrilled that on June 11th, 2014, the American Medical Association (AMA) adopted policy advocating for patient access to obesity treatment services including behavioral, pharmaceutical, nutritional and surgical interventions. This policy comes one year after the AMA recognized obesity as a “disease requiring a range of medical interventions to advance obesity treatment and prevention,” a decision I was thrilled to play a pivotal role in. [Read more]

For many years I have told my patients that obesity is not a problem of eating too much and exercising too little, in spite of this common stereotype that has been propagated everywhere from the lay press to physician beliefs. We have had good science to support that in fact obesity should be considered a disease and not simply a result of conscious behaviors dating back to the discovery of leptin, a hormone that fat cells make which governs appetite regulation, back in 1994. In 1998 our National Institute of Health recognized obesity as a disease. And today the American Medical Association adopted new policy recognizing obesity as a disease. [Read more]

This is a continuation of our discussion of weight loss myths, perceptions, and facts. Now it’s time to change gears again. In part one and part two of this series, we discussed myths (things that are believed but simply aren’t true), and in part three and part four we talked about presumptions (things we think are true but we can’t really prove it one way or the other – so, unsubstantiated beliefs). Let’s talk about some obesity FACTS that we KNOW are true. [Read more]

This is a continuation of our discussion of weight loss myths, perceptions and facts. In part one and part two of this series, we touched on myths about obesity and factors like goal-setting, physical education and sexual activity. Now, we continue our discussion of presumptions about obesity—the things we believe to be true about obesity that scientific evidence has not made certain. [Read more]