Safety of probiotics used to reduce risk and prevent or treat disease.

Objectives: To catalog what is known about the safety of interventions containing Lactobacillus, Bifidobacterium, Saccharomyces, Streptococcus, Enterococcus, and/or Bacillus strains used as probiotic agents in research to reduce the risk of, prevent, or treat disease.

Data Sources: We searched 12 electronic databases, references of included studies, and pertinent reviews for studies addressing the safety of probiotics from database inception to August 2010 without language restriction.

Review Methods: We identified intervention studies on probiotics that reported the presence or absence of adverse health outcomes in human participants, without restriction by study design, participant type, or clinical field.

Understanding and encouraging the overweight patient.

Objective. To enhance the psychiatrist's understanding of the effect of overweight and obesity on their patients' quality of life and psychological wellbeing and to examine how this can be improved, even in those patients who remain overweight.Design /Setting/Participants/ Measurements.

Perceived barriers to weight management in primary care--perspectives of patients and providers.

Background: Despite the consequences of overweight and obesity, effective weight management is not occurring in primary care.

Objective: To identify beliefs about obesity that act as barriers to weight management in primary care by surveying both patients and providers and comparing their responses.

Design: Anonymous, cross-sectional, self-administered survey of patients and providers of a Veteran's Administration Primary Care Clinic, distributed at the clinic site.