THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Saturday, October 19, 1996 TAG: 9610190236
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B3 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY PAT DOOLEY
STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: NORFOLK LENGTH: 68 lines
As most dieters know, shedding pounds can be a losing proposition.
Studies show that 95 percent of people who lose weight will gain it back - and then some - within five years.
At Eastern Virginia Medical School, one researcher is studying why some people are more prone to gain weight, and keep it, than are others.
Dr. Thomas J. Lauterio, associate professor of internal medicine, hopes his work with laboratory rats may one day yield a treatment for obesity, or even a way to prevent it.
His work received a boost last week from the National Institutes of Health, which has awarded Lauterio and two other U.S. researchers a $779,000 grant for four years of continued study into the causes of obesity.
Lauterio, who has studied obesity since 1987 at the school, has shown that some laboratory rats fed a 30-percent-fat diet become obese while others do not.
The rats begin at the same weight and are fed identical meals of sweetened condensed milk, corn oil and a protein called casein, Lauterio said. About half of the rats get fat.
Something in the genetic makeup of the obese rats, or ``gainers,'' sets them apart from the lean rats, or ``resisters,'' Lauterio and other researchers believe. And something happens in the rats' metabolisms that causes them to use fat differently.
``The fat rats don't eat any more than the ones that remain lean,'' Lauterio said.
Previous research has shown that all rats become overweight when fed excessively high levels of fat.
A 30-percent-fat diet better reflects the way most Americans eat, Lauterio said, and may help show why some people gain weight more easily.
Because rats metabolize nutrients much the way humans do, Lauterio's research may lead to preventive intervention for people who are predisposed to obesity, he said.
Research has long focused on animals and people after they gain weight. Those subjects have lower levels of growth hormone than do their lean counterparts. But scientists haven't known whether low growth hormone - or other factors - precede obesity or follow it.
Last month, Lauterio showed for the first time in any species that low growth hormone was present in the fat rats before they plumped up.
Lauterio now will look at what sets the gainers apart from their fat-resistant buddies.
Other hormonal factors may contribute, he said. And no one treatment may be the answer for every overweight person.
Two researchers working in conjunction with Lauterio will share in the grant: Dr. Carol Boozer of Columbia University in New York, and Dr. Barry Levin of East Orange Veterans Affairs Medical Center in New Jersey. The research, Lauterio said, may lead to clinical trials with people.
Someday, doctors may be able to pre-treat patients who are susceptible to obesity, Lauterio said.
That may be welcome news for the 59 percent of men and 49 percent of women in the United States who are obese, according to a report issued Tuesday by the National Center for Health Statistics.
In 1986, 51 percent of men and 41 percent of women were obese - defined as 30 percent or more over ideal weight. ILLUSTRATION: BILL TIERNAN
The Virginian-Pilot
Dr. Thomas J. Lauterio, in his laboratory in Norfolk, will share a
$779,000 grant with two researchers in other states.
KEYWORDS: GRANT OBESITY by CNB