Weight Loss News and Research

Latest Weight Loss News and Research

Alzheimer’s disease progression and body weight may be linked: Study

There have been studies that show that people who are overweight in middle age are more likely to develop Alzheimer's disease decades later than people at normal weight. However some studies also show that people in the earliest stages of Alzheimer's disease are more likely to have a lower body mass index (BMI).

22 Nov 2011

Post-surgery death risk high among thinner people: Study

A new study has found that thinner people are at a higher risk of dying within 30 days of an operation than heavier people. The cause behind this trend is not clear.

22 Nov 2011

Non-alcoholic fatty liver disease does not appear to affect survival

Non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) is a common condition associated with obesity and heart disease long thought to undermine health and longevity. But a new study by Johns Hopkins researchers suggests the condition does not affect survival.

22 Nov 2011

Oral delivery of PYY hormone can help obese people lose weight

Most people understand that serious weight loss requires changing attitudes toward what they eat and how often they exercise. But, what if the process could be aided by simply chewing a stick of gum after meals? That's the question a team of scientists, led by Syracuse University chemist Robert Doyle, is trying to answer. In a groundbreaking new study, Doyle's team demonstrated, for the first time, that a critical hormone that helps people feel "full" after eating can be delivered into the bloodstream orally.

22 Nov 2011

Financial incentives effective at altering 'simple' behaviors in socially disadvantaged groups

Financial incentives work for doctors. Could they work for patients, too? Could they encourage them to change unhealthy behaviors and use preventive health services more? In some cases, yes, according to Dr. Marita Lynagh from the University of Newcastle in Australia, and colleagues. Their work, looking at why financial incentives for patients could be a good thing to change risky health behaviors, indicates that incentives are likely to be particularly effective at altering 'simple' behaviors e.g. take-up of immunizations, primarily among socially disadvantaged groups.

21 Nov 2011

ZEVALIN treatment for Non-Hodgkin lymphoma becomes simpler with removal of bioscan requirement

Spectrum Pharmaceuticals, a biotechnology company with fully integrated commercial and drug development operations with a primary focus in hematology and oncology, received approval from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) on November 18, 2011 to remove the pre-treatment biodistribution evaluation requirement using Indium-111 ZEVALIN imaging dose followed by a gamma scan before administering the ZEVALIN therapeutic dose.

21 Nov 2011

New, incision-free surgery to manage chronic acid reflux

Adam Vasser would wake up at night choking on partially digested food and liquid. Stomach acid burned the delicate tissue of his throat. "I'd sleep really badly," he said. During the day, he sometimes suffered from heartburn.

19 Nov 2011

New white paper on potential role of EBTs in treating obesity

The American Society for Gastrointestinal Endoscopy (ASGE) and the American Society for Metabolic & Bariatric Surgery (ASMBS) have issued a new white paper on the potential role of endoscopic bariatric therapies (EBTs) in treating obesity and obesity-related diseases like Type 2 diabetes.

18 Nov 2011

Eli Lilly provides $4M in additional funding to IDRI for new TB therapies

Eli Lilly and Company today announced that it is providing more than $4 million in additional funding to the Infectious Disease Research Institute. The funding will allow IDRI to continue its early phase drug discovery efforts focused on identifying new and better therapies in the fight against tuberculosis, including multidrug-resistant strains known as MDR-TB.

17 Nov 2011

Weight loss in obese children reduces adulthood health risks: Study

A new study from the Murdoch Children's Research Institute and Menzies Research Institute has found that obese children who shed weight in later years can reverse the damage done to their health by being overweight and it is really never too late. Overweight people reportedly have an increased risk of type 2 diabetes, clogged arteries or atherosclerosis, high blood cholesterol and high blood pressure.

17 Nov 2011

Mediterranean diet can reduce risk of future heart disease

A team of Johns Hopkins researchers has uncovered further evidence of the benefits of a balanced diet that replaces white bread and pasta carbohydrates with unsaturated fat from avocados, olive oil and nuts — foods typical of the so-called "Mediterranean diet."

17 Nov 2011

More risk of health problems in lean children who become obese as adults

Frequent counseling, physician support and interactive website help obese patients lose weight

Obese patients enrolled in a weight-loss program delivered over the phone by health coaches and with website and physician support lost weight and kept it off for two years, according to new Johns Hopkins research. The program was just as effective as another weight-loss program that involved in-person coaching sessions.

16 Nov 2011

Combination of REGN910 and aflibercept inhibits tumor angiogenesis in animal models

Combining the investigational agents REGN910 and aflibercept yielded statistically significant improvements in antitumor effects in animal models compared with either agent alone, according to results presented at the AACR-NCI-EORTC International Conference: Molecular Targets and Cancer Therapeutics, held Nov. 12-16, 2011.

14 Nov 2011

Fish consumption linked to lower risk of diabetes

A study analyses the dietary patterns of the adult Spanish population with high cardiovascular risk. The results reveal a high consumption of both red meat and fish. However, whilst eating lots of cured meats is associated with greater weight gain and a higher obesity rate, the consumption of fish is linked to lower glucose concentrations and a smaller risk of developing diabetes.

11 Nov 2011

Dramatic rise in obesity, fatty liver disease increases need for transplants

The dramatic rise in obesity is leading to more fatty liver disease in the United States, increasing the need for more transplants at a time when there already is a severe shortage of donated organs.

11 Nov 2011

School lunches improve health outcomes of children

The federally funded National School Lunch Program (NSLP) provides free and reduced-price meals to more than 31 million children every school day, according to its website.

11 Nov 2011

Drug effectively combats obesity in “couch potato” monkeys” Study

According a new study an experimental anti-cancer drug could help fight obesity. The drug chokes off the blood supply to fat cells and helped obese monkeys slim down in the experiments.

10 Nov 2011

Obese premenopausal women may benefit from dairy food consumption

A recent study accepted for publication in The Endocrine Society's Journal of Clinical Endocrinology & Metabolism (JCEM) found that consumption of dairy foods and higher protein resulted in improvements in markers of bone formation and reductions in markers of bone degradation in overweight and obese young women over 16 weeks of diet- and exercise-induced weight loss.

10 Nov 2011

Experimental drug selectively destroys blood supply of fat tissue and decreases body fat

Obese rhesus monkeys lost on average 11 percent of their body weight after four weeks of treatment with an experimental drug that selectively destroys the blood supply of fat tissue, a research team led by scientists at The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center reports in Science Translational Medicine.

10 Nov 2011