Word: orlistat
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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...diet pills has been pretty dismal. Amphetamines, which speeded metabolism and suppressed appetite, looked promising in the 1950s and '60s but turned out to be physically harmful and powerfully addictive. Drugs like fen-phen and Redux, which alter the brain's chemistry, had scary side effects. Newer drugs like orlistat and food substitutes like olestra keep fat from entering the body, but they cause serious bowel discomfort...
That's one reason orlistat users are supposed to change their eating habits. If someone takes it without also switching to a low-fat diet, says Dr. Michael Hamilton, director of Duke University's Diet and Fitness Center, "that person is going to have a rude awakening...
Beyond that, orlistat isn't dramatically effective by itself. All the patients in the double-blind study went on strict eating regimens and exercise programs. Half of them were given orlistat, and half got an inert placebo. While those in the orlistat group lost an average of 10% of their initial weight after six months, the folks on the sugar pills lost nearly as much--a not inconsiderable...
That's not enough of a difference to justify putting orlistat on the market, says Dr. Jules Hirsch, an obesity expert at Rockefeller University and a member of the FDA advisory panel that evaluated the drug. Hirsch voted against approval. "We're talking about something that will take a little bit of weight off--a little more than a placebo--for a few years," he says, "but that will not make obesity vanish. The question is, How valuable is that...
...itself, not all that valuable. Ideally, says St. Luke's Heymsfield, doctors should first urge obese patients to change their diet and start exercising regularly. If they still can't lose weight, he would add orlistat to the mix. Another possibility, suggests Duke's Hamilton, is to use orlistat with an appetite suppressant. The value of this new drug, says Heymsfield, is that it adds to the available anti-obesity therapies and lets doctors tailor the treatment to a patient's needs. "I don't see Xenical as something to displace one or another of the currently available drugs...