“Our paper shows that after gastric bypass surgery there are changes in the levels of hormones that control appetite and body weight; these changes may help the individual lose weight while controlling hunger.”

The prevalence of obesity is increasing rapidly worldwide. People who are obese are at increased risk of developing serious health problems. Unfortunately, there are very few effective treatments for weight loss so increasingly, obese individuals are undergoing bariatric surgery, which is the most effective method of obtaining and maintaining a reduced body weight.

Our paper shows that after gastric bypass surgery there are changes in the levels of hormones that control appetite and body weight; these changes may help the individual lose weight while controlling hunger. The results of our study shed light on possible ways of affecting hormonal changes in the absence of surgery for effective obesity treatment.

I became interested in this field after working with animal models of obesity. The discovery that there are many hormones made by fat cells, the stomach and intestine, that regulate body fat stores and appetite by communicating with the brain, led me to thinking about how this system may change when people try to lose weight.

I wanted to study these hormones after talking with patients who had bypass surgery and finding that many of these individuals were not hungry—even though they were consuming far fewer calories—and who now weighed considerably less than they had weighed for most of their adult lives.