VIDEO: Maximizing medical therapy critical to successfully managing obesity

NEW ORLEANS – Recognizing the challenges of obesity as a chronic disease is critical in implementing pharmacotherapy, but taking steps to maximize a patient’s overall medicine regimen is important in achieving weight loss and the resultant health benefits, Louis J. Aronne, MD, Sanford I. Weill Professor of Metabolic Research at Weill Cornell Medicine in New York told Healio Family Medicine.

Current obesity medications can achieve a 5% weight loss and decisions should be made to minimize the risk of side effects, he said. Clinicians also should consider combination therapy, as they would do for other chronic conditions, such as hypertension or diabetes.

Optimizing a patient’s overall medical regimen to eliminate agents associated with weight gain is also critical, as they offset potential benefits from obesity medications, he added.

“We find that many people don’t lose weight when we prescribe medicine because they are taking something that makes them gain weight… You have to change their underlying medical regimen,” Aronne said.

For more information:

American College of Physicians Internal Medicine Meeting 2018 Educational Program Handouts https://annualmeeting.acponline.org/educational-program/handouts

Endocrine Society. Pharmacological Management of Obesity Guideline Resources. https://www.endocrine.org/guidelines-and-clinical-practice/clinical-practice-guidelines/pharmacological-management-of-obesity

Saunders KH, et al. Med Clin North Am. 2018;doi: 10.1016/j.mcna.2017.08.010.

Disclosure: Aronne reports stock options with BMIQ, Zafgen, Gelesis, MYOS and Jamieson Laboratories, research grants from Aspire Bariatrics, Eisai and AstraZeneca, and consultant agreements with Jamieson Laboratories, Pfizer, Novo Nordisk, Eisai, GI Dynamics, Real Appeal, Janssen, UnitedHealth Group Ventures and Gelesis.