Blog Purpose

I created this blog in response to my reddit post on 17 oct 2012:

Hello Reddit,

Before I start, I am a Medical Librarian. I have worked for different hospitals and gov agencies retrieving and reviewing literature for physicians, researchers and specialists. I am NOT a doctor or fitness expert and this is not a full blown systematic review or meta-analysis. I am not giving health advice but wanted to share with you.

I’ve been heavy my entire life and have lost and regained hundreds of pounds over the years using many weight loss books, programs, fads, OTC herbal aids, etc. I am very much shaped like a lemon - I taper at the top and bottom and carry all my weight in my middle (big belly and shelf above the ass). My lowest adult weight was 221 pounds and my heaviest was 365 pounds (I’m female, 27 years old and 5’9) – currently I weigh around 250 and am looking to lose weight for good.
I finally had an epiphany – why don’t I do a literature search myself and see what the peer reviewed medical research is saying about weight loss and belly fat. No more shitty commercials and false hopes.

So, I performed a literature search in Medline, Cochrane and CINAHL databases. (If anyone wants my search strategies, I have them saved on my work PC and can get them to you). Out of the couple hundred search results on visceral obesity/central adiposity and weight loss, I read through around 30 articles so far (still reading). This doesn’t sound like a lot but once you limit the articles to humans (no animal studies) and omit the ones with shoddy methodology, and those ones whose results were not significant – there weren’t that many left to review. I've found some pretty interesting things so far.

I am planning on creating my own fitness and eating guidelines based on my findings. Would anyone be interested in this? If I do it for just myself, I’ll just start making changes and see what happens – but if you guys are interested – I’ll make sure to cite the articles and studies, justify in writing the reasoning behind the choices and closely monitor my body changes. No underwear pics though - not my style.

Let me know.