WEIGHT REDUCTION;

Objective: Obesity is a serious disease and a precursor to other morbiditiessuch as CVD and type 2 DM. Lifestyle modifications are recommended to control obesity alongwith pharmacological and surgical interventions. In this study, we evaluate the beneficial effectsof orlistat in BMI reduction of obese patients in an OPD setup of Azad Jammu Kashmir. StudyDesign: It is a quasi-experimental placebo controlled trial. Setting: Divisional HeadquartersHospital Mirpur Azad Kashmir. Period: October 2013 to March 2014. Methods: 75 patients wereenrolled having BMI of more than 27 using BMI machine model 2012. 38 Patients were randomlyselected to receive orlistat 120 mg B.D for two months. 32 patients were given placebo and thereduction in BMI between the two arms was analyzed using SPSS 20. Results: After two monthsof study, significant reduction of 2.78 kg +/-1.718 kg in weight was observed in the study group.The reduction in average BMI in study group was 1.867 with -5.21 % reduction in BMI vs controlgroup which had an average BMI reduction of 0.46 with -1.411% reduction in BMI. The p value is0.001. 37.71% of patients taking orlistat reported side effects such as flatulence, fatty stools andmyalgia which were 8%, 18.91% and 10.8% respectively. Conclusions: Orlistat along with lifestyle modification is effective in BMI reduction of patients significantly as compared to placeboand may be helpful in reducing the morbidity and mortality in the long term. However, cautionshould be administered with orlistat because of high incidence of associated side effects.