Biography

David Arterburn, MD, MPH, is a general internist and health services researcher who focuses on finding safe, effective, and non-stigmatizing ways to treat obesity. As an international leader in obesity research, his goal is to help individuals and families make treatment decisions that align with their values while sustaining their health over the long haul.

Dr. Arterburn's research portfolio includes studies of the impact of neighborhood environments on obesity, mindfulness-based interventions for weight loss, obesity pharmacotherapy, the long-term outcomes of bariatric surgery, and implementation of shared decision-making tools and processes. He recently led the PCORnet Bariatric Study, a two-year, $4.5 million study comparing the health benefits and safety associated with the main types of bariatric surgery in 41 health systems in the United States. Funded by the Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute (PCORI), the study’s results give patients and their health care providers the information they need to decide which type of surgery is best for them. Dr. Arterburn is also filling in evidence gaps on obesity medications through 3 new National Institutes of Health (NIH) grants that will:

• Compare outcomes of different medications
• Compare medications versus bariatric surgery for diabetes treatment
• Design and test interventions to increase equitable use of obesity medications, leading to templates that can be used by other health systems  

Over the past decade, Dr. Arterburn has collaborated with Kaiser Permanente Washington's specialty leadership to implement and evaluate shared decision-making with patient decision aids to support elective surgical care. The approach has shown great promise for improving the quality of health care while simultaneously lowering the costs of care in some populations.

Dr. Arterburn collaborates extensively in his research and has federally funded projects related to obesity and bariatric surgery with investigators at University of Washington (UW), Duke University, Harvard, University of Pittsburgh, University of Michigan–Wake Forest, University of Maryland–Baltimore, and the Cleveland Clinic.

Dr. Arterburn joined Kaiser Permanente Washington Health Research Institute in 2006. In recognition of his contributions to science, he has been named an honorary Fellow of the American Society of Metabolic and Bariatric Surgery (FASMBS) and a Fellow of the American College of Physicians (FACP) and The Obesity Society (FTOS). Dr. Arterburn is past chair of the Adult Obesity Measurement Advisory Panel sponsored by the National Committee on Quality Assurance and founding chair of the Obesity Society's  Health Services Research Section. In 2013 he co-chaired the NIH Symposium on the Long-Term Outcomes of Bariatric Surgery, and in 2025 he will co-chair the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases (NIDDK) Workshop on Leveraging Real-World Evidence to Optimize Use of GLP-1-Based Therapies. He is also an affiliate professor in the UW Department of Medicine.​​​​​