New pharmacological tools for obesity

Obesity is a multi-factorial, chronic disorder that has reached epidemic proportions in most industrialized countries and is threatening to become a global epidemic. Obese patients are at a higher risk from coronary artery disease, hypertension, hyperlipidemia, diabetes mellitus, certain cancers, cerebrovascular accidents, osteoarthritis, restrictive pulmonary disease, and sleep apnea. Obesity is a particularly challenging clinical condition to treat, because of its complex pathophysiological basis. Indeed, body weight represents the integration of many biological and environmental components. Efforts to develop innovative anti-obesity drugs have been recently intensified. In broad terms, researchers use different distinct strategies: first, to reduce energy intake; second, to increase energy expenditure; third, to alter the partitioning of nutrients between fat and lean tissue. In the present review we concentrate on the first of these strategies, by underlining the new pharmacological tools which are presently studied.