“Obesity is the number-one health problem in the United States because it negatively affects our population’s health more than any other condition,” said Kaiser Permanente Washington Health Research Institute Senior Investigator David Arterburn, MD, MPH. Kaiser Permanente Washington researchers are doing practical research to learn how doctors, patients, families, employers, and policymakers can best work together to prevent and treat obesity.
“We’re focusing on three ways to halt the obesity epidemic,” said Senior Investigator Dori Rosenberg, PhD, MPH. “We’re helping to change obesity-promoting environments, bringing evidence-based prevention and treatment programs into health care systems, and helping people develop lifelong healthy diet and activity habits.”
Kaiser Permanente Washington obesity research areas include:
“Obesity is caused by many factors, so at Kaiser Permanente Washington, we’re working on many levels,” said Paula Lozano, MD, MPH, a senior investigator and Kaiser Permanente Washington’s assistant medical director for preventive care. “We’re improving health care to help people who are obese now. But since obesity is a societal problem, we’re also studying how to change our homes and workplaces and neighborhoods to create more healthy environments.”
Thapa B, Schmittdiel JA, Arterburn D, Neugebauer R, Dyer W, O'Connor PJ, An J, Cassidy-Bushrow AE, Gilliam LK, Hooker SA, Nolan MB, Oshiro CES, Thomas T, Simonson G, Dombrowski SK, Rodriguez LA. Clinical and demographic characteristics associated with diabetes remission in six integrated health care systems: A retrospective cohort study. Diabetes Care. 2025 Jul 30:dc250530. doi: 10.2337/dc25-0530 [Epub ahead of print] PubMed
Sloan CE, Zepel L, Smith VA, Arterburn DE, Baecker A, Clark AG, Kawatkar AA, Kane RM, Daigle CR, Coleman KJ, Maciejewski ML. Health expenditures decline after bariatric surgery for patients with Type 2 diabetes. Diabetes Care. 2025 Jun 12:dc250254. doi: 10.2337/dc25-0254. Online ahead of print. PubMed
Sun S, Haneuse S, Levis AW, Lee C, Arterburn DE, Fischer H, Shortreed S, Mukherjee R. Estimating weighted quantile treatment effects with missing outcome data by double sampling. Biometrics. 2025 Apr 2;81(2):ujaf038. doi: 10.1093/biomtc/ujaf038. PubMed
Arterburn D, Garcia R, Rosenberg D, Johnson E, Mettert K, Ng J, Brewer J. Practical Awareness-Based Strategies for Eating (PASE): A pilot and feasibility randomized trial. Obesity Sci Pract. 2025 Feb 12;11(1):e70052. doi: 10.1002/osp4.70052. eCollection 2025 Feb. PubMed
Simonson DC, Gourash WF, Arterburn DE, Hu B, Kashyap SR, Cummings DE, Patti ME, Courcoulas AP, Vernon AH, Jakicic JM, Kirschling S, Aminian A, Schauer PR, Kirwan JP. Health-related quality of life and health utility after metabolic/bariatric surgery vs. medical/lifestyle intervention in patients with type 2 diabetes and obesity: The ARMMS-T2D study. Diabetes Care. 2025 Apr 1;48(4):537-545. doi: 10.2337/dc24-2046. PubMed
![]() David E. Arterburn, MD, MPHSenior Investigator |
![]() Paula Lozano, MD, MPHSenior Investigator; Director, ACT Center |
![]() Allen Cheadle, PhDSenior Investigator, KPWHRI; Senior Research Associate, CCHE |
![]() Dori E. Rosenberg, PhD, MPHSenior Investigator |
![]() Gregory E. Simon, MD, MPHSenior Investigator |
![]() Andrea J. Cook, PhDSenior Biostatistics Investigator |
![]() Beverly B. Green, MD, MPHSenior Investigator |
![]() Maricela Cruz, PhDAssistant Biostatistics Investigator |
![]() Mikael Anne Greenwood-Hickman, MPHSenior Collaborative Scientist |
![]() Laurel Hansell, MA, MPHCollaborative Scientist |
![]() Nicole M. Gatto, PhD, MPHPrincipal Collaborative Scientist |