“Someone busier than you is running right now.”
“I don’t stop when I’m tired, I stop when I’m DONE!”
19th Jan is women's healthy weight day. I’ve never heard of it either but its true and it exists. Weight is a sensitive topic in many people’s lives- teens and adults alike.
Phrases like above float around all over social media. The media portrays an illusion of what the body should look like, people are thus more than ever motivated to achieve these body standards.
On the bright side, the world has become a lot more open and encouraging about body positivity, bullying due to weight, and living healthy.
Health isn’t going to be achieved as soon as you hit a specific number on the weighing scale, it is a lifelong process.
On this Women’s healthy weight day, let’s learn about a few diseases causing weight gain and weight loss along with the obesity epidemic and a few ways to stay healthy this year.
There are times when weight fluctuations are caused by diseases that are already there:
And there are times when a person becomes more susceptible to diseases due to weight fluctuations.
Weight management, though necessary, is not compulsory for everyone. Each person’s body type is different thus having different metabolism rates.
Obesity is one of the leading causes of many diseases. Most of the time, the weight can be managed through exercise and diet.
This requires consistency and discipline. Though it is a hard feat, it can be achieved.
Did you know that there’s an obesity epidemic?
“At the other end of the malnutrition scale, obesity is one of today’s most blatantly visible – yet most neglected – public health problems. Paradoxically coexisting with undernutrition, an escalating global epidemic of overweight and obesity – “globesity” – is taking over many parts of the world. If immediate action is not taken, millions will suffer from an array of serious health disorders.”-WHO
The fact that the obesity epidemic didn’t flash over countries like a wildfire-rather it smoldered and then slowly grew year after year-has made it even more difficult to combat, since its causes have become so intertwined into the social, environmental, and governmental fabric.
New applications have been produced in order to better manage weight. These mobile applications are continuously being produced. Are they actually that effective?
A study was conducted to check the effectiveness of mobile health control technology in adolescents and teens.
The study revealed that it didn’t cause a significant weight loss in obese children.
For EXTREME cases, a few innovations were made to overcome them
Premeal capsule
Gelesis100 (Plenity), approved by the FDA in April,2019 is an exciting weight management innovation.
It is a weight loss device and comes in the capsules form. The capsules are filled with hydrogel particles. When taken with a full glass of water before meals, the particles expand in the stomach and take up space, leading to the sensation of fullness.
Although Plenity comes in capsule form, it is actually a weight loss device, not a medication. The gel particles eventually move through the intestinal tract, and are broken down by enzymes and excreted.
In the pivotal randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled clinical trial about 60% of those who followed a diet, an exercise plan and took Plenity lost 5% or more of their initial weight. And about 25% of those who took it were high responders, losing 10% or more of initial weight. Average weight loss was modest: -6.4% for the Plenity group vs -4.4% for the control group. (Of note, the desired endpoint of achieving at least 3% more weight loss in the Plenity group compared to the control group was not met.)
No treatment-related serious adverse events occurred. In addition, Plenity is not absorbed into the body at all. As a result, there is little reason to worry about pharmacologic side effects, or interactions with other medications, both of which frequently limit
A few others are:
Intestine-lining sleeve
Fat-cell conversion
To overcome the obesity pandemic, many different pharmacological therapy,
Currently, the FDA has approved several molecules for the treatment of obesity, both in monotherapy and in combination.
Many different combination of drugs were used in the different studies, a weight reduction of at least 5%, compared to placebo was seen during 52 weeks of observation. Phentermine-topiramate and liraglutide have been associated with the highest probability of at least 5% weight loss.
Phentermine is a sympathomimetic anorectic agent, chemically related to amphetamine whereas topiramate is an anticonvulsant used to treat certain types of seizures. The mechanism of action for these two drugs is unknown but it is widely used for weight loss.
The drugs, associated with the standard diet and/or exercise protocols, represent a good therapeutic opportunity to allow not only weight loss but also to reduce the risk of developing diseases caused by obesity, particularly cardiovascular diseases, and to maintain the set objectives over time. However, future research on the pharmacological treatment of obesity should encourage greater personalization of therapy, given the differences in safety, efficacy and response to therapy, in the different subpopulations of patients with obesity.
Ways to keep yourself healthy this year:
Water
Healthy diet
Supplements(IF REQUIRED)
Go easy on the alcohol
Set realistic goals for yourself
So, these were a few things about weight that you should know.
At the end of the day, it's you who gets to decide what is good and what is not good for yourself.
If there’s anything else you want to know about, let us know in the comments down below!
Stay happy and healthy👨⚕️👩⚕️