Research
Hormonal
Recombinant leptin therapy successfully treats obesity in individuals with inborn leptin deficiency by reducing hyperphagia and promoting substantial fat mass loss.
If you have been diagnosed with inborn leptin deficiency, recombinant leptin therapy is a proven, effective treatment that can significantly reduce fat mass and normalize eating behaviors by addressing the underlying hormonal deficit.
GoodSupportsHIGH confidence
The successful treatment of children with leptin deficiency with recombinant leptin showed for the first time that mutations in a single gene could lead to hyperphagia and obesity... Farooqi et al. described the rapidly altered eating behaviour upon initiation of treatment with recombinant leptin; food ingestion ceased to be the major focus of daily (and nightly) activity of the thus treated children... weight loss (primarily fat mass) was shown to be substantial.
Why this rating
Based on successful clinical trials in specific patient cohorts (children and adults with inborn deficiency), though sample sizes are small compared to polygenic studies.
Source
From monogenic to polygenic obesity: recent advances
Anke Hinney et al. · European Child & Adolescent Psychiatry · 2010
DOI 10.1007/s00787-010-0096-6
narrative_reviewCited 245×
Read the paper DOI resolved against Crossref · corpus check 2026-06-10
More from this paper
- Common genetic variants in the FTO gene (specifically rs9939609) are associated with a modest increase in BMI and a higher risk of obesity, primarily by influencing energy intake and satiety rather than physical activity.Strong
- Mutations in the MC4R gene are a significant cause of monogenic obesity, resulting in increased body weight, hyperphagia (larger meals), and potentially reduced energy expenditure, but not necessarily binge eating.Good
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