manage weight

Personal Weight Struggles Require a Personalized Approach

By Dr. Kushner / January 1, 2025 /

I learned long ago that generic weight loss advice doesn’t work well for most people. That’s because managing weight is personal, influenced by your likes and dislikes, health goals and personal challenges. This applies whether or not you’re taking one of the newer anti-obesity medications. I wrote my book, Six Factors to Fit: Weight Loss that Works…

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Improving Weight Management Outcomes Beyond the Scale

By Dr. Kushner / December 18, 2024 /

We are a weight-focused society but when it comes to managing weight long term, having a weight-only narrow focus can be detrimental. Throughout my 4-decade career I have stressed the importance of lifestyle modification being foundational for losing weight and achieving better health. Now with an average 15-20% weight loss with the new injectable obesity…

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Can Your Cell Phone Help You Eat Better, Move More, Stress Less?

By Dr. Kushner / December 9, 2024 /

One of my yearly medical student classes I teach at Northwestern University is helping our future physicians learn behavior change strategies to improve their own health. Examples of targeted health behaviors may include not exercising regularly, not eating enough fruits and vegetables, eating too many sweets or fast food, not getting enough hours of sleep…

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It’s Saturday Night! 3 Healthy Eating Nudges to Help you Stay on Track

By Dr. Kushner / November 16, 2024 /

Your Saturday night outings may be the one day of the week when you let your guard down and don’t pay much attention to what or how much you eat. Though weekends are a time to unwind and have fun – they don’t have to derail all the progress you’ve made during the week. Dinners…

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Healthy Eating Shortcuts

By Dr. Kushner / October 10, 2024 /

Healthy eating requires planning ahead. Though this does take some time, it doesn‘t have to be so time intensive. In this blog, I share some time-saving tips that help my family eat better and healthier. 1 – Try Convenient Apps for Shopping No time to go to the grocery store? Check out your neighborhood for…

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Managing Weight is Personal

By Dr. Kushner / August 18, 2024 /

I learned long ago that generic weight loss advice doesn’t work well for most people. That’s because managing weight is personal, influenced by your likes and dislikes, health goals and personal challenges. Different people have different struggles managing weight, depending on who they are and how they live their life. This applies whether or not…

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Expanding the Provision of Obesity Care

By Dr. Kushner / August 12, 2024 /

As an obesity medicine physician, I have been on a mission to train health care professionals about providing obesity care in their practices. Most recently, I spoke at the American Society for Preventive Cardiology Congress where the room was packed with colleagues wanting to learn about new obesity care treatments. The timing was perfect as…

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3 Mindset Tweaks to Manage Weight Better

By Dr. Kushner / June 5, 2024 /

When managing body weight, you’re probably laser-focused on how your weight is changing day to day or week to week. This most likely applies whether or not you’re also taking obesity medications. Though I advocate tracking body weight as a good self-monitoring tool, weight is only 1 metric of health. If you’re someone who loses motivation easily…

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Social Prescriptions to Enjoy Better Health

By Dr. Kushner / May 2, 2024 /

What does it mean to be healthy? According to the World Health Organization (WHO), “health is not merely the absence of disease but is a state of complete physical, mental and social well-being.” In Christina Caron’s recent New York Times article, When the Prescription is for a Dance Class, not a Pill, she describes a…

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Obesity Care Rx Considerations

By Dr. Kushner / April 6, 2024 /

Effective obesity care management begins with lifestyle modification (healthy eating patterns, increased physical activity and health behavior modification) for everyone as this is needed for optimal health. For select patients where lifestyle management is not effective enough to achieve improved health, medications or bariatric surgery can also be considered. As new and more effective medication…

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