Archive for November, 2015

Liraglutide and Heart Disease

November 10, 2015 — If you thought that the onslaught of new studies was done with the closing of ObesityWeek on Friday, think again. Now we have two important new studies of liraglutide and heart disease that were presented at the Annual Scientific Sessions of the American Heart Association (AHA) on Sunday and Monday. The study that’s hogging all the […]

Obesity and Nutrition: Learning Failures

November 9, 2015 — A fascinating session on the closing day of ObesityWeek asked an important question. How can failed studies — studies with negative outcomes — become opportunities for learning from failures, instead of learning failures? In an opening presentation, David Allison outlined the many opportunities and some failures to take the right learning away from nutrition and obesity […]

ObesityWeek 2015: Top Ten to Take Home

November 8, 2015 — Gee whiz, our brains are full. After a week of listening and learning from the smartest people in the world about obesity, we all need some time to it take home from ObesityWeek 2015 and just digest it. But while you’re digesting, here are some things to reflect upon. Brain Drain & Gain. The neuroscience presented at this […]

Brain Stimulation and Appetite Reduction

November 7, 2015 — The closing day of ObesityWeek did not disappoint, right up to the very end of the day. A symposium on brain science was one of more than a dozen sessions that left us with impossible choices in the last three hours Friday. This symposium was an outstanding follow-up to the paper presented by Marci Gluck on […]

Fat Shaming Is Down, But Weight Bias Persists

November 6, 2015 — A new study presented today at ObesityWeek in Los Angeles provides a bit of good news and a bit of bad news about bias against people living with the disease of obesity. Data from research with more than 70,000 U.S. adults beginning in 2013 suggests that “the public increasingly understands that obesity is more complicated than simplistic […]

The Obesity Disconnect Between Patients and Clinicians

November 6, 2015 — A team of leading obesity experts and advocates for people with obesity are presenting qualitative research today at ObesityWeek that suggests a profound disconnect between people with obesity and their healthcare providers. While clinicians see obesity through a lens of health and disease, people with obesity see it more through a lens of lifestyle and social relationships. […]

Covering Obesity in Health Plans?

November 5, 2015 — Presenting new data at ObesityWeek 2015, Obesity Action Coalition Chairman Ted Kyle said Wednesday that roughly three-quarters of consumers report their health plans are not covering obesity care. He told Endocrinology Advisor: These findings are a wake-up call because without coverage for evidence-based obesity treatment, people are delaying medical care until they have complications that […]

Obesity Care Seen Through Fresh Eyes

November 4, 2015 — In the ObesityWeek advocacy forum Tuesday, three speakers challenged advocates for obesity care to look at the issue of access to obesity care through fresh eyes. Access to care has been typically framed as a health issue. But Jennifer Shinall of the Vanderbilt University Law School explained that a more productive approach might be to frame […]

Getting a Handle on Better Obesity Care

November 3, 2015 — It’s a little hard to tell if we’re making progress toward better obesity care. Maybe that’s why it’s important to start a conversation about obesity care with National Obesity Care Week. It’s not like we’re lacking for headlines about obesity. You can find lots of talk about obesity everywhere you turn. The problem is that all […]

Potato, Potahto, Prevention and Treatment for Obesity

November 2, 2015 — Earlier this year, a leading group of public health experts in obesity wrote of “patchy progress on obesity prevention.” They lamented “overly simple dichotomies” that “dominate the thinking about obesity and its solutions.” Prevention and treatment is one of the false dichotomies they named. A new publication of 15-year outcomes from the Diabetes Prevention Program (DPP) […]