Having had a normal weight in childhood, obesity entered my life when I had my child in 1993. I gained a total of 40 kg over the next 14 years despite diet monitoring, physical exercise and obesity medication available back in time. No matter what I did I couldn’t stop putting on weight… I was almost 100 kg in 2007 and the consequences of so much weight were so clear: pain in lower back, ankles and knees, fat in my liver but even more scary – high blood sugar levels. I was a single mother and my only concern was that my health would deteriorate so badly that I’d leave my kid an orphan. As nothing less invasive seemed to help me in losing my body weight, I decided to have bariatric surgery. Although I’m having a normal weight for the last 11 years, I still struggle every day to keep it in control. Today I use my story to advocate for the cause of defeating Obesity together with my scientific background. I am a pharmacist contributing that better and effective drug treatment for losing weight is available to an affordable cost to all people in need of it. The collaborative relationship between patients living with a chronic disease and pharma is a win-win situation. Patient experiences, perception and opinions are heard by the companies behind new therapeutic options that hopefully will bring more quality to patients’ life. This close dialogue helps to educate and raise the awareness of the burden caused by these diseases both on an individual and society perspective. The potential products can show exciting results in the laboratory and animals but only patients have the actual experience in their disease control. By giving the patients the opportunity of sharing their feedback from beginning of a product development the companies are able to make available better treatment options that meet patients’ expectations on a faster fashion.
