Weight Loss Clinics, Marketing at It's Finest!

America is obese.

This we know.

Because of this people are looking to others for help them lose the weight. I see a great deal of people who ask questions about what works best for weight loss. Many of these patients want to try a quick fix pill or a trendy diet and see results in a week or two. Lots of questions have recently focused on the Jillian Michaels line of diet pills or Hydroxycut. Both of these medications are choc full of stimulants like caffeine that may help in weight loss, but also can raise blood pressure increase, affect sleep patterns and induce heart palpations among other detrimental side effects. Proof in this is just how many times Jillian Michaels has been sued over her diet pills, here is one example. A lot of patients do not understand this and thus are glad when I give them my professional input.

So if a pharmacist knows, wouldn't a weight loss clinic be a great place to try to find my answer?

Although this sounds logical, I would vehemently disagree, and here's why...

Weight loss clinics really play on insecurities of those who are either insecure or desperate enough to ask for professional help to lose weight. However, many of these clinics are nothing more than business fronts that can be fairly lucrative, especially since a lot of these patients usually have good occupations and are willing to pay out of pocket for the services that are rendered.

I had a patient who came into my pharmacy today who really verified what I feel about most weight loss clinics. Possibly even worsening it.

A 30 something year old, well dressed, African American female came into my pharmacy with 2 prescriptions, one for Adipex and one for Lasix. Due to my states stringent laws regarding weight loss medications, I was forced to call the "physician's" office to get the patient's BMI since it was not written on the prescription. While I was dialing the patient walked over to the closest area to me she could and asked me, "Why do you need to call? I have been on this before!" Thus another hurdle my state law gives me is that a patient can only be on Adipex for 12 weeks then MUST take a 6 month break before resuming therapy. Sure enough, she had this medication 3 months prior and was in violation of the previously stated law. Great...

I approached the patient and explained the laws to her and showed her that I had written the date of the last time she had the medication filled, since it could not be legally filled. We went back and forth a little bit, both arguing our points, until she finally asked me, "Why is this so hard to get my weight loss medicine? It's not like this stuff kills people!"

She must have been a carpenter because she hit the nail on the head!

I then explained to the patient about why the combination of Phen-Fen, was taken off of the market and how medications like Adipex may cause health problems. She gave me a baffled look. I also explained to her that by taking the second prescription, Lasix, would cause her to be dehydrated, causing her heart rate to increase and thus cause even more stress on her system. Although, I know some physicians do this, I am not a fan of it. "Well I have had issue of my heart rate going crazy and I have been drinking a lot of water and sucking on cough drops but my mouth is always dry. Do you think this could be why?" I told her it very well could be asked her a few more questions and deduced that it was probably due to the medications she was given.

This is when she dropped a bomb on me.

"Well ya know when I go in there, no doctor even sees me. I only see a few assistants who weigh me, ask me what weight I want to get to, nod their head and give me these scripts. They never really tell me nothing!"

Lovely... Just frickin' lovely! Now I know the "physician" who signed these prescriptions didn't even see her! Even worse, she wasn't really sure if the assistants she saw had any degree above a nursing degree (note, I clarified and she meant RN. She knew they were not CNPs or allowed to prescribe). She said they always left then came back with the prescriptions in hand. That's gotta be legit, right?

I then shared a brief story with her about a patient I had previously who was given diet pills from a weight loss center that were put in a pill bottle with a label that only read, "Diet Pills, Take 1 with breakfast and 1 with lunch". This was done to cover up the fact that the drug was not legal in the USA. By law the label MUST have the drug name, dose, quantity, directions, prescriber and the place they were filled at (if not more in some states). My current patient then said, "Well they did give me Adipex out of their office, that's why I waited so long before bringing in this prescription." Even better! Now they are handing out schedule III medications, like they are blue M&M's!

After explaining to me that she no longer trusted the less than legitimate weight loss center, she asked me "Well what can I take to lose weight

Ah, the trillion dollar question is what is the magic pill to help us lose all this weight? The answer is simple.

NONE!

That's right there is no magic pill that will magically make you lose all of those pounds you put on by being lazy, slacking off and eating like crap. Some pills may help but the only healthy to lose weight is at the very least to watch what you eat and then add exercise as seen fit.

I explained this concept to her, politely, as I could see she was lacking confidence in medical professionals, and she was very grateful. I can't say that I changed the world for her or even solved her problem BUT the one thing that makes me feel good about this situation was the fact that I educated somebody (who hopefully will tell others) about a shady weight loss clinic. I can only hope that this place gets shut down as it is clearly just a money scam that really does not care about the size and health of their patients but rather the size an health of their wallet. This is literally finding a market that there is expendable money, targeting it, and then maximizing it's efficiency to increase profit. What a scam! More proof of marketing at it's finest!

That being said there are many gastroenterologists and other physicians who are more than willing to ETHICALLY and PRACTICALLY help their patients lose weight. I applaud their efforts. However, it truly saddens me how some people have gone so far to turn the practice of medicine and the use of pharmaceuticals into a drive thru business.

One more reason why taking time when necessary can make a difference in your patients health.