TEDMED; Obesity a symptom rather than the cause of disease

[BainsBane]

Peter Attia

[Ed Suspicious]

1. Moving. What a beautifully empathetic man. His idea makes a ton of sense to me. I'm not

sure how clinical and functional treatment would change by putting the obesity as the symptom, but it should definitely change the mindset surrounding the condition, and that is a good thing.

[BainsBane]

2. That sort of compassion seems rare in doctors

I hope his research proves successful.

[TroubleMan]

3. Dr. Attia is great- his blog is excellent and extremely informative

http://eatingacademy.com

His series on cholesterol is a masterpiece:
http://eatingacademy.com/nutrition/the-straight-dope-on-cholesterol-part-i

I'm glad the TedMed talk is finally up.

[BainsBane]

5. Thanks for those links

[MrMickeysMom]

4. Thanks for putting this out here...

I agree with all that's been said, too.

Medicine does have a future, given the evolution of attitude. It's amazing what we learn in such a current broken system, but it renews the spirit of what it's supposed to be.

[BainsBane]

6. especially to know there are doctors/researchers who care

this much. At least we know there is one such person.

[zebonaut]

7. GOP run corporations feeding us cheap sugared processed carbohydrates

High glycemic cheap processed carbs; its not the fat; its the starch

[JM42]

8. It certainly is. Do you want a bag of chips for $.99 or pay $2.99 for a brocolli crown?

How about a $3.45 gallon of milk vs a $.99 3 ltr bottle of soda? Most people on food stamps get between $50 and $100 per month. Try feeding a family on that. I dare you. They eat shit because shit is cheap compared to actual food. So yeah, obesity is going to be a problem. It isn't because they're loading up on crab legs, steak, veal, chicken, and caviar. It's because they stretch every dollar they have. I've been there.

[KurtNYC]

9. Standing O

very good

[NoMoreWarNow]

10. It's a good talk but I'm not sure about his science

the fact is that multiple studies have shown that obesity directly promotes insulin resistance, and the mechanisms are pretty clear. I have just been reading about this. The increased fat leads to inflammatory immune cells that produce cytokines that cause cells to become insulin resistant.

Now it certainly possible that this pathway doesn't always work the same way in people as it does in lab animals, but he shouldn't pretend that we don't know how obesity causes insulin resistance.

[BainsBane]

11. I don't believe that's what the science proves

Doesn't it instead show a correlation between obesity and insulin resistance?

[NoMoreWarNow]

12. In animal models at least,

a high fat diet clearly induces obesity and inflammatory cells that make factors that cause insulin resistance. The science is pretty strong on this. The big question though is how much of the human disease is accounted by this pathway. My guess is that it's a major factor.

[BainsBane]

13. Two points

1) he is suggesting that the problem metabolizing glucose might cause the obesity, not the other way around.
2) What does that mean for obese people who do not have elevated blood sugar levels?

[NoMoreWarNow]

14. ok-- part of this is that fructose, which is a component of sucrose, can directly cause metabolic s

metabolic syndrome. Sucrose, which is common sugar, and high fructose corn syrup is just basically broken down sucrose, is composed of glucose and fructose. Anyway, fructose is weird, and can't be metabolized like glucose. Basically fructose gets converted more easily into fat than glucose. So high sugar consumption can lead to metabolic syndrome and obesity. But there are complicating factors that aren't well understood--- some people seem way more susceptible to this effect than others. Obese people can indeed not be insulin resistant, but basically the odds of being insulin resistant are much higher if you are obese. There are likely genetics factors that play into this. Anyway, this is my understanding of this area. Maybe this guy knows all this and was just playing up the overall theory and skipping over a lot of details.

I should probably look him up and see what he's actually published.

[BainsBane]

15. I don't think he pretends to know it all

Last edited Wed Jul 10, 2013, 11:56 PM - Edit history (1)

Rather he is posing questions for research that I believe he said he is actively working on. I'd be interested in what you find from looking him up.

[NoMoreWarNow]

16. I don't see anything from him in Pubmed on obesity or diabetes

but there is some stuff on immunotherapy and melanoma, which he said he worked on:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/?term=Attia+P[Author]


He is pretty visible on google though!
https://www.google.com/search?q=peter+attia&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&aq=t&rls=org.mozilla:en-US fficial&client=firefox-a

[BainsBane]

17. He also is described as a nutritionist

I wonder if you did an open subject search what you would find.