Our Program
Built on scientifically sound principles as found in the professional literature — not fads, not trends, not emotion.
Your first visit, step by step
The first appointment is the longest one. It is where the evaluation happens and where your plan gets built. Everything after it is shorter and more focused.
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New patient information
Thorough review of your paperwork.
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You choose how that first visit happens
New patients can come to the St. Louis office for the initial visit, or do the whole thing by video. Either way you see a health care professional. And whichever you choose at the start, you can book an in-person visit whenever you want one.
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Your numbers
Vital signs and a computerized body composition analysis, so there is a real baseline to work from rather than just a number on a scale. You will also be asked to provide recent lab values from your primary care provider; otherwise we give you a lab request you can take to the lab of your choice.
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Examination by a health care professional
A focused exam. Your questions get answered, and you get specific instruction in what must be done for this to succeed. This is the part of the visit that matters most, and it is not rushed.
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A visit every six months
Between visits you simply request a refill when you need one. A virtual visit is required every six months — a progress check on weight, how the plan is working, and any adjustment that is needed. It carries a professional fee.
Reasonably priced
Professional fees, prescription costs, and B12 injections are all very reasonably priced. We will go over exactly what your visit involves when you call.
What you pay depends on what you choose — how much medication you take home, and whether you add a B12 injection.
We accept
- Cash
- Visa
- MasterCard
- Discover
- CareCredit
Payment is due at the time services are rendered. We do not accept personal or third-party checks.
How often you have to be seen
A virtual visit every six months. That is the requirement — not monthly, and not in person.
In between, request a refill whenever you need one and take one, two, or three months of medication at a time. Your choice, and you can change it any time.
We moved to this rhythm during the pandemic and kept it, because patients did just as well on it and it takes a great deal of hassle out of their year.
Everything comes from us
Medication and B12 are dispensed by this office. Anything mailed to you is insured, and the tracking number is emailed to you the moment it goes out.
What makes this different from a diet
Evidence, not trends
Our protocol comes from the professional literature on obesity medicine. When the evidence changes, the protocol changes with it.
One patient at a time
What is needed is a global educational program. What we can actually deliver is one-on-one instruction, done properly, to people who are motivated to learn.
Physician-supervised throughout
Medication is prescribed and dispensed by a physician who knows your history and reviews your progress at every visit. Nobody is left on autopilot.
Education is the product
The prescription helps with hunger. The education is what keeps the weight off after the prescription stops.
Maintenance counts
After about ten percent of total body weight comes off, health and quality-of-life benefits show up. Holding onto them is a program of its own.
What we will and will not tell you
We will not tell you this is easy, that it is fast, or that the weight will stay off on its own. Much of the success of this program depends on your effort, and there is no guarantee or assurance that it will work for any individual patient.
We will also tell you plainly that appetite suppressants carry risks. The more common ones include nervousness, sleeplessness, headache, dry mouth, weakness, tiredness, elevated blood pressure, and rapid or irregular heartbeat. Less common but more serious risks include primary pulmonary hypertension and valvular heart disease. These are discussed with you in full, in writing, before you consent to treatment.
Against that, there are real risks in remaining overweight or obese — high blood pressure, diabetes, heart attack and heart disease, and arthritis of the hips, knees, and feet among them. Those risks rise the more overweight a person is. Weighing one set of risks against the other is a decision you make with your physician, with all the time you need to make it.
And we will tell you that watching your weight is a lifelong job. Anyone who says otherwise is selling something.
What have you got to lose — except the weight?
Call the office during business hours, or send a text any time — we pick messages up and get back to you.