Obesity

“We’re looking for innovative ways to both treat and prevent obesity — including creating healthier environments and designing programs for whole families.”

David Arterburn, MD, MPH
Kaiser Permanente Washington Health Research Institute Senior Investigator
Washington Permanente Medical Group, Internal Medicine

Research overview

“Obesity is the number-one health problem in the United States because it negatively affects our population’s health more than any other condition,” said Kaiser Permanente Washington Health Research Institute Senior Investigator David Arterburn, MD, MPH. Kaiser Permanente Washington researchers are doing practical research to learn how doctors, patients, families, employers, and policymakers can best work together to prevent and treat obesity.

“We’re focusing on three ways to halt the obesity epidemic,” said Senior Investigator Dori Rosenberg, PhD, MPH. “We’re helping to change obesity-promoting environments, bringing evidence-based prevention and treatment programs into health care systems, and helping people develop lifelong healthy diet and activity habits.”

Kaiser Permanente Washington obesity research areas include:

reducing sedentary behavior and promoting physical activity and healthy diet in various age groups, populations with chronic conditions, and families;
shared decision making to help patients find the best way to a healthy weight;
implementing health coaches in primary care to support behavior changes;
social networks that support lifestyle change programs;
relationships between medications and genetic factors in developing obesity;
health system, community, and national policies that address obesity;
relationships between obesity and depression, diabetes, and other conditions; and
long-term benefits and risks of bariatric (weight loss) surgery.

“Obesity is caused by many factors, so at Kaiser Permanente Washington, we’re working on many levels,” said Paula Lozano, MD, MPH, a senior investigator and Kaiser Permanente Washington’s assistant medical director for preventive care. “We’re improving health care to help people who are obese now. But since obesity is a societal problem, we’re also studying how to change our homes and workplaces and neighborhoods to create more healthy environments.”

Recent publications on Obesity

Robinson JR, Carroll RJ, Bastarache L, Chen Q, Pirruccello J, Mou Z, Wei WQ, Connolly J, Mentch F, Crane PK, Hebbring SJ, Crosslin DR, Gordon AS, Rosenthal EA, Stanaway IB, Hayes MG, Wei W, Petukhova L, Namjou-Khales B, Zhang G, Safarova MS, Walton NA, Still C, Bottinger EP, Loos RJF, Murphy SN, Jackson GP, Abumrad N, Kullo IJ, Jarvik GP, Larson EB, Weng C, Roden D, Khera AV, Denny JC Quantifying the phenome-wide disease burden of obesity using electronic health records and genomics 2022 Dec;30(12):2477-2488. doi: 10.1002/oby.23561. Epub 2022-11-13. PubMed

Coleman KJ, Shu YH, Fischer H, Johnson E, Yoon TK, Taylor B, Imam T, DeRose S, Haneuse S, Herrinton LJ, Fisher D, Li RA, Theis MK, Liu L, Courcoulas AP, Smith DH, Arterburn DE, Friedman AN Bariatric Surgery and Risk of Death in Persons with Chronic Kidney Disease 2022 Dec;276(6):e784-e791. doi: 10.1097/SLA.0000000000004851. Epub 2021-03-03. PubMed

Coleman KJ, Wellman R, Fitzpatrick SL, Conroy MB, Hlavin C, Lewis KH, Coley RY, McTigue KM, Tobin JN, McBride CL, Desai JR, Clark JM, Toh S, Sturtevant JL, Horgan CE, Duke MC, Williams N, Anau J, Horberg MA, Michalsky MP, Cook AJ, Arterburn DE, Apovian CM, PCORnet Bariatric Study Collaborative Comparative Safety and Effectiveness of Roux-en-Y Gastric Bypass and Sleeve Gastrectomy for Weight Loss and Type 2 Diabetes Across Race and Ethnicity in the PCORnet Bariatric Study Cohort 2022 Oct;157(10):897-906. doi: 10.1001/jamasurg.2022.3714. Epub 2022-08-31. PubMed

Buszkiewicz JH, Rose CM, Ko LK, Mou J, Moudon AV, Hurvitz PM, Cook AJ, Drewnowski A Associations between neighborhood built environment, residential property values, and adult BMI change: The Seattle Obesity Study III 2022 Sep;19:101158. doi: 10.1016/j.ssmph.2022.101158. Epub 2022-07-01. PubMed

Cruz M, Drewnowski A, Bobb JF, Hurvitz PM, Vernez Moudon A, Cook A, Mooney SJ, Buszkiewicz JH, Lozano P, Rosenberg DE, Kapos F, Theis MK, Anau J, Arterburn D Differences in weight gain following residential relocation in the Moving to Health (M2H) Study 2022 Sep;33(5):747-755. doi: 10.1097/EDE.0000000000001505. Epub 2022-05-20. PubMed