KEVIN MONTGOMERY, MD: Some of the ones that are most common and more severe are things like type 2 or adult onset diabetes, high blood pressure, sleep apnea, and other kinds of lipid disorders like elevated cholesterol or elevated triglycerides, many of which are risk factors for developing coronary artery disease.
ANNOUNCER: There are several strategies that obese people are encouraged to try, including exercise, dieting, behavior modification, as well as drug therapy. But while these tactics may help obese people reduce their weight initially, experts say that the likelihood of people maintaining that weight loss is slim.
DAVID PROVOST, MD: If we look at patients who undergo the medical management of obesity, whether it be dietary, exercise, behavioral, or ideally a combination of all of those, while a certain subset of patients may be able to lose up to fifty pounds, the percentage who can maintain that weight loss out beyond two years is much less than five percent.
Now with the morbidly obese, while certainly attempts at medical weight reduction are important and should be tried, the fact is, is that 99 percent of these people are not going to be able to achieve sustained weight loss through medical management alone.
ANNOUNCER: Because of the ineffectiveness of standard weight loss strategies, many morbidly obese people are turning to surgery in an attempt to try to lose the weight.
