Category Archives: Work

Big problems with Obesity

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There are a lot of complications that result from obesity. Here are some that I observe on almost a daily basis:

  • Obese people can’t exercise easily, which only compounds the difficulty in losing weight, since most studies have shown that exercise is a requisite for permanent successful weight control.
  • It may prevent needed diagnostic studies–there are weight limits for the tables used in medical imaging, for example. Even if one is under the weight limit, the bigger the patient the worse the quality of the study–fat scatters X-rays and exacerbates artifacts.
  • High blood pressure is difficult or impossible to control
  • Diabetes is difficult or impossible to control
  • Cholesterol levels are difficult or impossible to control
  • Obese patients wind up taking lots of medicines, sometimes ten or fifteen or even twenty different agents-expensive!
  • It promotes blood clots in the legs and lungs–potentially fatal
  • Obesity increases the risk of heart disease independently of other risk factors
  • It increases the risk of arthritis and early joint replacement
  • Chronic low back pain and accelerated arthritis can lead to painkiller addiction

We live in a food toxic environment with many people never doing more than going from car to house and back to car–a recipe for ever-expanding waistlines and more of the above.

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