Word: ghrelin
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Dates: during 2002-2002
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...that unusual, and while doctors still aren't exactly sure what's going on, a report in last week's New England Journal of Medicine offers a tantalizing clue. The loss of appetite in bypass patients may be linked to a recently discovered gastric hormone called ghrelin. Not only that, ghrelin may turn out to be one reason we feel hungry in the first place and why it's so hard for dieters to keep weight off. Understanding how ghrelin works could even lead to effective weight-loss drugs or drugs to promote weight gain in anorexics and cancer patients...
...researchers are careful to emphasize only what they know for sure. Their study involved just 28 patients, and while the scientists came to three conclusions, lead author Dr. David Cummings of the University of Washington says, "I feel very solid about two of them." The first is that ghrelin levels in the bloodstream rise significantly before meals and drop afterward. This suggests that ghrelin is involved in triggering the desire to eat--and indeed, earlier studies performed since the hormone was discovered in 1999 have shown that a ghrelin injection just before a meal causes people to eat more than...