MedicalResearch.com Interview with:
Amir Zarrinpar, MD, PhD
Assistant Professor, Division of Gastroenterology
University of California, San Diego
MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study?
Response: Over the last decade, physicians are beginning to recognize obesity as a disease that requires specific attention; they are more engaged with treating obesity itself rather than its metabolic consequences (such as type 2 diabetes, high blood pressure, cholesterol problems, and/or non-alcoholic fatty liver disease). However, treating obesity is very difficult and many patients don’t succeed in getting the minimum weight loss (approximately 5%) needed to get beneficial health effects. Recent obesity treatment guidelines recommend avoiding placing patients who are obese on obesogenic medication, or medication that have weight gain as a significant side effect.
Despite this recommendation, we noticed many patients who seek treatment for obesity in our clinics are on obesogenic medications. We first noticed that about 40% of patients who are undergoing bariatric surgery at UCSD were prescribed an obesogenic medication. These patients had worse weight loss outcomes compared to patients who did not have any obesogenic medications published that study recently in the International Journal of Obesity.
We wondered whether these findings were specific to bariatric surgery or if patients who were undergoing behavioral treatment (that is, diet and exercise) also had poor weight loss outcomes if they were on obesogenic medications. (more…)