November 11, 2025 — Just skimming headlines about new medicines for obesity and surgery, comparisons seem to be a dominant theme. Some of these headlines tell us surgery is more cost-effective or delivers more durable results. Some of that is certainly true. But the deeper truth surfaces this week in JAMA and JAMA Network Open. Clinical experience and, increasingly, […]
October 9, 2025 — At the annual meeting of the American College of Surgeons this week, six smart people debated the future of metabolic surgery versus medicines in the treatment of obesity. The interest in this debate is unmistakable. Our newsfeed is full of it. The undercurrent seems to be an implicit contest. Which is best? Which will prevail? […]
September 16, 2025 — Today in Nature Medicine, compelling new research tells that long-term outcomes with metabolic surgery are superior to the outcomes with GLP-1 agonists in persons with diabetes and obesity. These are impressive and important results. But we have to wonder if anyone is really listening. The enthusiasm for advanced obesity medicines is so great that many […]
September 8, 2025 — For a long time, the relatively few people with deep commitment to obesity care knew that multimodal therapy was necessary. Bariatric surgery centers of excellence assembled teams to deliver nutrition, mental health, and physical therapy support. But persistence with follow-up was often disappointing. Now, though, something different is emerging. Suddenly, multimodal therapy is the hot […]
August 19, 2025 — Increasingly, weight bias has gone underground. Explicit fat shaming has become socially unacceptable. But the human impulse behind it has not disappeared. So it pops up in diverse new ways. Like a school district that covers metabolic and bariatric surgery for employees, but requires a $5,000 copay that it refunds to employees only if they […]
August 17, 2025 — A new study in Obesity provides another piece of the puzzle of the influence of PFAS in obesity. PFAS is shorthand for per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances. People also refer to them as “forever chemicals” because they accumulate in our environment and our bodies. The new study tells us that PFAS exposure in teens having metabolic […]
August 7, 2025 — At the opening of the ANZMOSS (Australian and New Zealand Metabolic and Obesity Surgery Society) meeting today, we had the unique privilege of helping people peer into the future of obesity care. Endocrine surgeon Juan Pablo Pantoja presented a view of the future of bariatric surgery in the era of a medical frenzy. The frenzy, […]
July 15, 2025 — At ENDO2025 Saturday, we got a fresh view of the future that lies ahead for medical and surgical obesity care. In a sharp contrast to either/or constructs that pit medical and surgical care as rivals, endocrinology fellow Angela Rao presented data pointing to complementary roles for medical and surgical obesity care. Analyzing data from 846 […]
June 7, 2025 — Mental health often, but not always, improves after metabolic and bariatric surgery. But new research tells us that this is not really a direct consequence of weight reduction. Instead, it seems that better mental health very likely comes from the reduction in experiences of weight stigma. In fact, Larissa McGarrity and colleagues found that the […]
April 16, 2025 — Back in October, JAMA Network Open published a research letter suggesting that metabolic surgery numbers were “plunging” because of GLP-1 medicines. They claimed to observe a 26% drop in surgeries between 2022 and 2023 for privately insured patients. A few months later, the authors issued a correction and said the actual drop was more like […]
