Conventional Treatment Of Excess Storage Fat

Drug Treatment

Most of the current research on excess storage fat is aimed at identifying biochemical pathways that will be amenable to intervention with drug treatments. These medications would be specifically tailored to interfere with the energy cycles to facilitate weight loss. As of 2002, there are two major classes of drugs that are approved for the treatment. History of the field is littered with drugs that have failed or that have caused serious side effects. Appetite suppressant drugs change the amounts of some neurotransmitters in the brain. These chemical changes result in decreased appetite, but only in the presence of the drug. Digestive inhibitors are drugs that interfere with the breakdown and absorption of dietary fat in the intestines. These are, however, poorly tolerated by the person who is over weight because the effects of fat mal absorption are unpleasant.

These drugs also interfere with the absorption of some necessary vitamins. Fat substitutes, while technically not drugs, attempt to recreate the pleasant taste that fat adds to food, but create the same negative side effects as digestive inhibitors. In addition, excess weight returns quickly when appetite suppressants or mal absorptive agents are stopped.

The use of any drug is associated with unwanted side effects. No drug, current or past, has had such dramatic effects on excess storage fat that it warrants its casual use. They all do have side effects, some of them serious. While most of the immediate side effects that may occur are known, the long-term effects, in many cases, are unknown. Therefore the weight loss industry is geared to first give you the drug, and then give you more drugs to counter those side effects and the cycle goes on and on till your organs are either irrepairably damaged or you are broke.