Obesity and tobacco abuse, widely recognised as serious health hazards, are increasing in prevalence. Obesity is associated with numerous metabolic complications such as dyslipidemia, type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular diseases. Smoking is a high risk factor for hypertension, lung carcinoma and various other health related problems. The agents that have been used for the treatment of obesity in...

There is a huge void in the current pharmacological treatment options for obesity. This gap is surprising given the high prevalence and associated costs of obesity. Many factors have prevented active drug development, including the poor safety and efficacy of earlier antiobesity drugs. However, there are now several compelling targets on the horizon. The new generation of antiobesity drugs offe...

Overweight and obesity affect more than 60% of the population in the United States. Many social and environmental factors influence this phenomenon. Because of the tremendous difficulties associated with addressing these factors, health care providers have been looking for a magic pill that resolves this tissue. Although there is no panacea, this article is intended to concisely review commonly...

Overweight and obesity are highly prevalent in developed countries and are also becoming more frequent in the developing world. Overweight and obese patients have elevated levels of several inflammatory markers and this inflammatory state might contribute to their increased vascular risk. We summarize the effects of lifestyle changes, antiobesity agents, and bariatric surgery on serological inf...

We established depressive symptoms prevalence in 100 patients recommended to our obesity clinic and we started antidepressant treatment in 41 of them. It has been noted that administration of SSRI leads to weight reduction after 6 months, but is followed by a weight increase later. Our experience shows that 12 months long administration of bupropion and tianeptine leads to continuous weight los...

As a public health problem, childhood obesity operates at multiple levels, ranging from individual health behaviors to school and community characteristics to public policies. Examining obesity, particularly childhood obesity, from any single perspective is likely to fail, and systems science methods offer a possible solution. We systematically reviewed studies that examined the causes and/or c...

The pandemic of overweight and obesity continues to rise in an alarming rate in western countries and around the globe representing a major public health challenge in desperate need for new strategies tackling obesity. In the United States nearly two thirds of the population is overweight or obese. Worldwide the number of persons who are overweight or obese exceeded 1.6 billion. These rising fi...

In many industrialized nations, obesity is now considered an epidemic, resulting in accelerated morbidity and mortality. Obesity is associated with an increased risk of coronary artery disease as well as the metabolic syndrome comprising abdominal obesity, increased fasting blood glucose levels, dyslipidemia and hypertension, which are all recognized cardiovascular risk factors. Diet, exercise,...

Ancillary therapies for weight management, consisting mainly of diet and exercise programs that incorporate variable levels of lifestyle modification techniques, are frequently ineffective to achieve clinically meaningful weight loss and maintenance. Although pharmacological treatment of obesity is widely used in most countries, the number of available drugs is still very limited. The most wide...