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| WEIGHT LOSS The Unbiased Truth  There are many fads, diets, exercises,OTC pills, shakes, nutrition systems, "look at me, I'm a paid celebrity" products. Losing weight falls into 2 possible categories: 1. Decrease Calories (food) i.e. diet, Prescription medicine 2. Increase Metabolism (burning calories) i.e. exercising or artificially speeding up your heart rate (OTC diet pills, like Ephedra, which has been banned in the U.S. citing strokes, heartattacks by speeding up the heartrate. 
Your BMR (Basal Metabolic Rate) of course depends on many factors such as height, weight, age, fitness level, but let's round this number to 2000 just for discussion. Your BMR is the average number of calories consumed by normal body processes- eating, drinking, sleeping, etc. We must eat something to sustain ourselves, although this exact amount is highly variable and debatable.
3600 calories = 1 pound of fat. To lose 1 pound of fat we must either burn or decrease our caloric intake by this many calories. Calories from food come from one of three sources: Fat, Carbohydrates (sugars) or Protein. It is a FACT that too much Protein (chicken, fish) can NOT be stored by your body. It is also a FACT that too many Carbohydrates (sugar- soda, orange juice, candy, rice, BREAD) is converted to Fat for storage in those little troublesome Fat cells. Fat is the storage form for the body's energy source. It would have been so nice to have extra energy stored as nice lean protein found in muscle, but that's simply not the way it happened. These are the FACTS. The sooner we come to the realization of this simple TRUTH the sooner we can minimize the size of our troubled areas. Fat cells act as storage tanks for energy, much in the same way a gas tank stores fuel which provides energy for your car. Imagine if your car had extra gas tanks to carry stored fuel. You could either choose to stop by a gas station and refuel or use some of your extra gas tanks. If you decrease the amount of food (gas) you consume, your body (car) will use the energy (fuel) stored in the extra energy storage tanks, i.e. fat cells.
One way to lose weight is to burn more calories than your BMR (2000 calories). 1) Exercise: Burning calories is in theory a good way to lose weight. However, practically speaking, as evidenced in the following example, we realize that running a mile a day doesn't really help us lose weight. Example: Running a mile a day burns 100 calories. You would have to run 36 miles to burn 1 pound of fat. 2) Diet pills to increase your heart rate and in turn increasing your BMR to burn more than the normal 2000 calories a day in theory makes sense, but at what risk to your overburdened heart? There are a plethora of over the counter products or online products that utilize ingredients to speed up metabolism to burn calories, mostly speeding up the heart, which is not healthy, hence the ban on the substance Ephedrine. Other over the counter products "claim" to work on cortisol levels and other medical/scientific "sounding hormones", etc. These products are often FDA approved for safety, but water is safe and sugar pills are safe. The FDA does not approve the "claims" made by those companies. Soon we will have a review for this category as many consumers are duped by cleverly marketed, yet ineffective products. Liposuction will lead to permanent removal of fat cells, which is aesthetically appealing, but not practical to lose weight. We treated the symptoms of overeating (fat), but not the cause. Overconsumption of calories is still the root of the cause of Obesity. 
The best and most healthy way to lose weight is to decrease the number of calories consumed. 1) Diet foods: Consuming low calorie foods will reduce caloric intake. To date however there is not one published scientific Unbiased study that proves that diets will sustain weight loss. In theory, yes. Practically, however, humans crave flavor, taste and variety. 2) Prescriptions to decrease absorption of foods consumed also makes sense in theory. There are many prescription medicines that work to decrease absorption of fat, but the side effects are disgusting, frothy fat stools. 3) Curbing your appetite is the ultimate key to losing weight. If we could simply not over eat obesity wouldn't exist. The fact is that most of us have an evolutionary gene that causes over eating, which probably helped us avoid starvation during times of famine. We are genetically engineered to over consume and store energy. Humans store energy in the form of fat. Most of us must consciously work to avoid over eating. . Endocrinology is the study of the organs responsible for many of our daily functions, including appetite control. Some people have an increased appetite while others simply don't even think about eating. This is simply genetics at play. ACCP physicians have the knowledge to discuss weight loss medicines that act to decrease your appetite.  With the introduction of fatty foods from fast food restaurants, preying on this well known phenomenon, it should be to no ones's surprise that Obesity is an epidemic in this country. It is also well known that the COCA (cost of customer acquisition) for a new consumer of a fast food restaurant is the most expensive consumer, whereas, having that consumer try new foods is much less expensive. Now, take a play book from the addictive ingredient "nicotine" that was added to tobacco and "cocaine" which was originally added to the earlier versions of soda products then couple that with the often buried truth that FAT cells release hormones that trigger hunger, it should be no surprise that causing Obesity really wasn't that difficult. The more weight we gain, the more calories we need to sustain ourselves. The more food we consume, the more profits the fast food industry generates. This is the business implication that has fueled this epidemic. Now, how does the healthcare industry get involved? Obesity leads to hyptertension, high cholesterol and diabetes. 87% of all cases of Diabetes in this country are Type 2, which is caused by the body's inability to keep up with insulin production caused by the overconsumption of food. It is estimated that 35 million Americans have some form of diabetes, 10%- that is shocking. Big Pharma simply makes everyday pills necessary to avert further complications from these symptoms. What a marriage of industries. The federal government is the only business whose sole revenue stream is generated through taxation. That is as far as we will go. Consumer beware. |
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