We know that the basic ingredients in our food have played a major role in the progression of our country's obesity epidemic -- it's not all about our genetics and our sedentary lifestyle. Yet, armed with this knowledge, and amid a bevy of weight loss pills, exercise routines and diet fads galore, we continue to have trouble controlling what we eat and how much of it we eat.
One competing strategy to beat these struggles centers on brain circuitry and how we respond to food: the activation of reward neurocircuitry, increasing attention to and arousal by food stimuli and other food-related cues like advertising. Can we impart several simple ideas on our patients to improve their control mechanisms for food desires and food intake? Dr. David Kessler says we can.
Dr. Kessler, the commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration from 1990 to 1997, former dean of the medical schools at the University of California, San Francisco and Yale University and author of the new book, The End of Overeating: Taking Control of the Insatiable American Appetite, joins hosts Dr. Matthew Birnholz and Dr. Michael Greenberg for a fascinating discussion about why many of us overeat and what we can do to stop these unhealthy eating habits.
Dr. Birnholz and Dr. Greenberg will also tackle a few other noteworthy questions on health literacy and social media in medicine: Does a patient's lack of understanding about their own anatomy tell us more about their commitment to their health? And is Twitter a useful tool for those of us looking to improve our Web presence and provide additional avenues for communication with our patients?
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