Obesity Medicine

A 47-year-old woman who recently completed adjuvant chemotherapy for colon cancer has painless cervical lymphadenopathy of 1 to 2 cm. She has no fever, sore throat, cough, or unexplained weight loss, and she denies exposure to ill persons or animals.

Respondents to a MedPage Today poll were almost equally split over whether bariatric surgery should be first-line therapy in the treatment of obesity, but most of those who said Yes did so with reservations.

BETHESDA, Md. -- Emphasizing that asthma affects different patients in different ways, the National Asthma Education and Prevention Program has issued new evidence-based guidelines on the disease.

SEATTLE -- ZIP codes and property values will provide a better handle on the scope of the nation's obesity problem than income, race, or education, investigators here reported.

BOSTON -- Whole grains may help prevent type 2 diabetes, with consistent results across studies, researchers said.

BOSTON -- The development of type 2 diabetes -- or at least part of it -- may be in your head, researchers here said.

LEXINGTON, Ky. -- Intensive behavioral therapy helped severely obese patients lose at least 100 pounds in 44 weeks and maintain 60% of the loss at five years, researcher here reported.

OAKLAND, Calif. -- Untreated gestational diabetes nearly doubles the risk that offspring will be obese by kindergarten age, but treatment of maternal hyperglycemia can prevent it, said investigators here.

WASHINGTON -- Mississippi has exceeded the 30% obesity rate, the first time any state's population has done so, reported a health advocacy group. But 19 other states with large obese populations are not far behind.

BOSTON -- Myocardial infarction more than doubles the risk of new-onset diabetes and leads to a 15-fold increased risk of impaired fasting glucose, results of a study of more than 8,000 MI patients show.

Take this MedPage Today survey on bariatric surgery.

DALLAS -- An over-abundance of a key hormone protects the "world's fattest mice" from the metabolic effects of their excess fat, researchers said.

MELBOURNE, Australia -- Adolescent boys deprived of a high glycemic index junk-food diet had better clearing of acne vulgaris in 12 weeks than a medicine chest full of pimple medications can provide.

BOSTON -- Obesity may be caused -- at least in some cases -- by a virus, researchers said here.

GOTHENBURG, Sweden -- Two research groups have provided long-awaited evidence that bariatric surgery saves lives, up to 136 per 10,000 operations.

WINNIPEG, Manitoba -- Physiologically appropriate infant weight loss is less for babies fed formula in the hospital than for those who are breastfed, suggesting that hospitals feed too much, researchers said.

IOANNINA, Greece -- Clinicians may have to reassess the ABCs of the gender differences in disease manifestations specifically linked to X or Y chromosomes.

BOSTON -- Childhood hypertension is there, if only pediatricians would look for it. Most of the time, they don't, investigators here reported.

ROCHESTER, Minn. -- A decade before women develop dementia, they may begin to have an unexplained loss of weight, according to investigators here.

CLEVELAND -- The efforts to raise HDLs to reduce atherosclerosis is still a worthy objective despite a series of disappointments with new drugs, said clinicians here.

WASHINGTON -- The 2007 President's Cancer Panel blasted industry policies and government inaction for failing to help the public make lifestyle changes needed to protect against cancer.

NEW YORK -- Women who develop gestational diabetes may be at increased risk for pancreatic cancer decades later, reported researchers here.

BOSTON -- A previously unsuspected independent risk factor for pancreatic cancer may be a low level of plasma insulin-like growth factor binding protein-1 (IGFBP-1), found researchers here.

LONDON -- An "eating for two" approach to junk food during pregnancy and breastfeeding may boost baby's appetite for the same and lead to obesity, researchers said.

ANN ARBOR, Mich.-- Only one in three patients who are told they have chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) have had that diagnosis confirmed with spirometry.

BOSTON -- After curative surgery and adjuvant chemotherapy for stage III colon cancer, patients who ate a high-fat diet were more likely to have a recurrence than those who ate a so-called prudent diet, researchers here reported.

BELFAST, Ireland -- Sedentary adults who took a brisk half-hour walk on only three days a week lost weight and were rewarded with improved fitness and cardiovascular benefits, researchers reported.

NEW YORK -- As breast cancer diagnosis and treatment options grow more complex, race plays a larger role in survival, researchers here reported.

DALLAS -- For assessing obesity's impact on atherosclerosis risk, the waist-to-hip ratio tops body mass index and waist circumference, investigators here found.

SANTA MONICA, Calif. -- Better diabetes detection over the past 25 years has actually reduced estimates of skyrocketing disease and shifted disparities from race and ethnicity to education.