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American Morning

Hormone Tells Stomach It's Full

Aired September 04, 2003 - 08:44   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.


SOLEDAD O'BRIEN, ANCHOR: A hunger hormone makes adults eat less, a new study says. And it could lead to a new treatment for obesity.
Dr. Sanjay Gupta joins us this morning from Los Angeles with details on that.

Hey, Sanjay, good morning.

DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Soledad.

The hormone is called PYY. It is produced by your intestines after you eat. The more you eat, the more of this hormone is produced. The key is, this hormone tells your brain that you are full and makes you stop eating.

What they have found is that obese people actually don't have as much of this hormone. At least that's the result of a study that's published in the "New England Journal of Medicine." A pretty good study.

It looked at twelve obese people and twelve lean people. The key to the study was trying to figure out if you actually give this hormone in place of a meal, could you actually curb appetite? What they did was they actually infused, some of the patients got what's called a placebo, just some salt water. Other of the patients actually got this hormone, and they were all studied about two hours later.

They actually offered them an unlimited buffet meal to try and figure out how much they would actually eat. What they found, in the case of both obese and lean people, two hours later they had a 30 percent decrease in overall caloric intake. That was a significant decrease that actually lasted for a full day afterwards.

So again, about two hours after the infusion, a significant decrease. That decrease lasted about 24 hours, sort of new findings here, Soledad. This PYY hormone may be a treatment for obesity later on down the road. People said they were surprised at how little they ate after the infusion.

O'BRIEN: A couple quick questions for you, Sanjay. First, this is not saying necessarily that it leads to losing weight.

GUPTA: Yes, you know, it's an interesting point, actually. It seems intuitive that you say, OK, if you eat less you're going to actually lose weight. Investigators say not so fast. It doesn't always translate, as obvious as that may be. It still depends on what a person's metabolism is, their food choices, things like that.

It's really important, as well, to just get a good look at how this hormone actually works and what happens. It's pretty simple actually. Someone actually eats some food. It actually goes from their mouth down into their stomach, actually produced -- the hormone is produced by the intestines and then sends a signal back up to the brain. Can see that signal going back up to the brain now and saying you're full. So once you're full now, you'll stop eating.

Interestingly, as well, Soledad, that process happens in everybody. It happens in people who don't get this infusion, as well. The question is how long. Usually about half an hour or so. So about half an hour after you start eating does your body start to recognize that it's full. So if you're someone who eats a lot of food very fast, you're probably going to eat a lot before you actually recognize that you're full.

O'BRIEN: There was some word that if you eat a high fiber diet, that actually increases the body's production of this hormone PYY. So is the next step sort of intuitively to say, "Well, if I'm not getting these kinds of injections in studies," which people obviously don't have access to, maybe going for the high fiber diet is a good way to start?

HEMMER: Yes. And that's an excellent point, Soledad. It's going to be awhile, probably, before this particular PYY hormone is available in a pill form. It's just in IV form right now. So the question is what can you do in the meantime?

High fiber diets probably do increase your levels of this PYY. So if you eat a high fiber diet, and you eat high fiber at the beginning of your meal, that's probably going to give you a better chance of actually increasing your fullness hormone so you don't eat as much.

By the way, there's other methods out there to try and, you know -- medication methods to try and curb your appetite, as well. You probably heard of some of them. Meridia is one of the medications got a lot of play a few years ago. Orlistat and Zenical actually both block absorption of fat. Those medications are out there now, as well.

Gastric bypass surgery we talk about all the time. That's obviously an option, as well -- Soledad.

O'BRIEN: That's a pretty dramatic option. Sanjay, thanks for that information.

GUPTA: Thank you.

O'BRIEN: Appreciate it. Nice to see you, as always.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com






Aired September 4, 2003 - 08:44   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
SOLEDAD O'BRIEN, ANCHOR: A hunger hormone makes adults eat less, a new study says. And it could lead to a new treatment for obesity.
Dr. Sanjay Gupta joins us this morning from Los Angeles with details on that.

Hey, Sanjay, good morning.

DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Soledad.

The hormone is called PYY. It is produced by your intestines after you eat. The more you eat, the more of this hormone is produced. The key is, this hormone tells your brain that you are full and makes you stop eating.

What they have found is that obese people actually don't have as much of this hormone. At least that's the result of a study that's published in the "New England Journal of Medicine." A pretty good study.

It looked at twelve obese people and twelve lean people. The key to the study was trying to figure out if you actually give this hormone in place of a meal, could you actually curb appetite? What they did was they actually infused, some of the patients got what's called a placebo, just some salt water. Other of the patients actually got this hormone, and they were all studied about two hours later.

They actually offered them an unlimited buffet meal to try and figure out how much they would actually eat. What they found, in the case of both obese and lean people, two hours later they had a 30 percent decrease in overall caloric intake. That was a significant decrease that actually lasted for a full day afterwards.

So again, about two hours after the infusion, a significant decrease. That decrease lasted about 24 hours, sort of new findings here, Soledad. This PYY hormone may be a treatment for obesity later on down the road. People said they were surprised at how little they ate after the infusion.

O'BRIEN: A couple quick questions for you, Sanjay. First, this is not saying necessarily that it leads to losing weight.

GUPTA: Yes, you know, it's an interesting point, actually. It seems intuitive that you say, OK, if you eat less you're going to actually lose weight. Investigators say not so fast. It doesn't always translate, as obvious as that may be. It still depends on what a person's metabolism is, their food choices, things like that.

It's really important, as well, to just get a good look at how this hormone actually works and what happens. It's pretty simple actually. Someone actually eats some food. It actually goes from their mouth down into their stomach, actually produced -- the hormone is produced by the intestines and then sends a signal back up to the brain. Can see that signal going back up to the brain now and saying you're full. So once you're full now, you'll stop eating.

Interestingly, as well, Soledad, that process happens in everybody. It happens in people who don't get this infusion, as well. The question is how long. Usually about half an hour or so. So about half an hour after you start eating does your body start to recognize that it's full. So if you're someone who eats a lot of food very fast, you're probably going to eat a lot before you actually recognize that you're full.

O'BRIEN: There was some word that if you eat a high fiber diet, that actually increases the body's production of this hormone PYY. So is the next step sort of intuitively to say, "Well, if I'm not getting these kinds of injections in studies," which people obviously don't have access to, maybe going for the high fiber diet is a good way to start?

HEMMER: Yes. And that's an excellent point, Soledad. It's going to be awhile, probably, before this particular PYY hormone is available in a pill form. It's just in IV form right now. So the question is what can you do in the meantime?

High fiber diets probably do increase your levels of this PYY. So if you eat a high fiber diet, and you eat high fiber at the beginning of your meal, that's probably going to give you a better chance of actually increasing your fullness hormone so you don't eat as much.

By the way, there's other methods out there to try and, you know -- medication methods to try and curb your appetite, as well. You probably heard of some of them. Meridia is one of the medications got a lot of play a few years ago. Orlistat and Zenical actually both block absorption of fat. Those medications are out there now, as well.

Gastric bypass surgery we talk about all the time. That's obviously an option, as well -- Soledad.

O'BRIEN: That's a pretty dramatic option. Sanjay, thanks for that information.

GUPTA: Thank you.

O'BRIEN: Appreciate it. Nice to see you, as always.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com