I became interested in helping people lose weight when I began to realize how important a healthy weight was. I had been practicing as a Primary Care Physician for over 10 years when I began to realize that I had patients that were bringing their pills to my office in a shoebox.
As Physicians, we learn how to treat High blood pressure, Diabetes, Heart disease, high cholesterol, and all the other problems that are weight related, but we never receive any training on how to help people lose weight. This is a crazy situation, because small drops in weight, if maintained over time, lead to a large improvement in overall health.
It is common to have people on 3 or 4 Diabetes pills, 3 blood pressure medications, pills for cholesterol, and arthritis in their joints--all at the same time. They may have to sleep at night with a mask because they have sleep apnea.
We can, and do, treat these problems individually, but I rarely find that patients are satisfied and consider themselves happy.
If we help them lose some weight, and enable them to quit some or all of their medications, and to sleep without a mask, and to look and feel better about themselves, that they are much more satisfied. It is very gratifying to treat people this way.
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