In order for a person to try to be at his or her optimum health, he or she should make regular visits to a physician in order to establish and receive care. If you've ever struggled with a weight problem, especially for a long duration of time, and you find yourself gaining, rather than losing weight no matter how hard you try, there could be a hormonal explanation, not just your diet, genetic disposition, family history and activity level, which are are all contributing factors, themselves, but the hormone leptin might possibly be involved in your situation as well.
Leptin is a protein hormone found in fat cells. Animal models are often used to help determine how to treat illnesses and conditions that can likewise occur in people. In other words, animal models are when animals such i.e. mice are administered tests to see how humans will react in a given situation without testing the human for possible side effects before a drug and/ or treatment is approved for and used by people.
Studies on mice have shown that when the protein hormone leptin is present in the body, it has been positively correlated with fat deposits in other animals, as well as humans (Pinel 2007). And when leptin has been introduced to the body in low, non-harmful dosages, there's been a reduction in the subjects eating habits, and body fat, and when this hormone has been absent in fat mice, there's been no reduction in fat (Pinel 2007).
The receptors for leptin are found in the brain.
However, there are still multitudes of differences between people and mice. Whereas, obese mice can have a mutation for the obese gene and low levels for feeling full, that's an occurrence that's rarely seen in people, though, not unheard of.
There was a case involving a young female patient who was of normal weight when she was born, but whom rapidly began to put on weight as she aged; She constantly ate and wanted to eat, resulting in a large weight gain (Pinel 2007). Due to her extreme obesity, she became deformed, and required surgery to straighten out deformities that developed in her extremities; prior to this treatment, at an early age, the subject received leptin therapy that worked quickly in aiding her in losing lots of weight over the course of a year (Pinel 2007).
Serotonergic drugs have been found to be instrumental in the reduction of food consumption in people and animals. It appears that Serotonin agonists have a short term effect of fullness after eating a meal. Various studies have found that serotonin agonists reduce the urges that obese patients have to consume high-calorie foods, and fats, the subjective intensity of hunger, size of meals, in-between snacking as well as binge eating (Pinel 2007).
Reference
Pinel, John, P.J. Basics of Biopsychology. University of British Columbia. Pearson Education, Inc. 2007. United States of America.
Whether you have a background in the sciences or humanities, this is an informative article about the hormone leptin. It's a hormone that could possibly be associated with weight gain and loss in some limited situations, though not as commonly heard of in humans, as in animals. According to different studies, a deficiency in or lack thereof leptin can affect the size and mass of animals more often than it does people.
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