Weight Loss

In a cohort of older adults who lost weight while participating in a lifestyle program, both those who went on to maintain their weight loss and those who regained weight after the program were susceptible to reductions of bone mineral density at the hip, according to findings published in Obesity.

Cardiovascular event risk for those with overweight or obesity can either be lowered or heightened with intensive lifestyle interventions depending on certain factors, according to findings published in Diabetes Care.

Weight loss interventions with game elements, especially competition, result in significantly greater increases in physical activity among overweight and obese adults compared with those that do not have game elements, according to study results published in JAMA Internal Medicine.

Incorporating an obesity medication regimen into a weight loss program can help adults with obesity reduce weight more effectively than nonpharmacologic approaches, especially if patients start taking the medications early, according to findings published in Obesity Science and Practice.

Physicians, particularly oncologists and specialists, frequently lack the time and resources to discuss healthy-lifestyle modifications with cancer survivors, according to study findings published in Cancer.

Participants in a randomized controlled trial who took liraglutide were more likely to develop gallbladder stones and other complications of the gallbladder and biliary tract vs. those who took placebo, according to findings published in Diabetes Care.

Currently, gastroenterologists and other physicians have quite a few options to treat overweight and obesity, but at times that is overwhelming.

Before 2015, managing obesity was the realm of other specialties. Although gastroenterologists have traditionally dealt with some of the comorbidities of obesity, they were not in position to target the root cause and provide relief in the form of weight management. That changed with the clinical introduction and FDA approval of several devices and procedures for the endoscopic management of obesity and metabolic disease, putting GIs right in the middle of the obesity epidemic.

Endoscopic sleeve gastroplasty produced clinically significant weight loss in patients with obesity, according to results of a meta-analysis.

Historians attribute Philip II of Macedon — father of Alexander the Great — as the source of the motto and political principle known as “divide and conquer.” As a ruling technique, the maxim worked, with Phillip ultimately ruling over most of classical Greece; a success that would be repeated with Julius Caesar and Napoleon Bonaparte in the centuries to follow.