Food addiction: New science vs. old myths

Dr. Joan Ifland

Dr. Ifland is a food addiction professional who is active in both online recovery and research.

Dr. Ifland has been an innovator in the field of recovery from food addiction since 1999 with the publication of her first popular book. She is the lead author of the first scholarly description of processed food addiction according to classic addiction diagnostic criteria and the first scholarly definition of addictive versus non-addictive foods.

Dr. Ifland earned her PhD in 2010 at Union Institute in addictive nutrition. Her MBA was awarded by Stanford Business School in 1978 and her BA in Economics and Political Science by Oberlin College in 1974. Dr. Ifland is a Fellow of the American College of Nutrition. She currently resides in the Seattle area where she enjoys hiking, women’s business groups, and the arts.

The perfect storm: when foods induce overeating and block weight loss

Dr. Joel Fuhrman

Joel Fuhrman, M.D. is a board-certified family physician, seven-time New York Times bestselling author (his latest book is Eat for Life), and nutritional researcher who has specialized for over 30 years in preventing and reversing disease through nutritional methods. At his Eat to Live Retreat in San Diego, CA, and through his books, television specials, and virtual speaking engagements, Dr. Fuhrman shares his life-saving nutritional protocols with hundreds of thousands of people around the world seeking to recover from obesity, food addictions, diabetes, heart disease, autoimmune disease, cancer, and other serious health concerns.

Dr. Fuhrman is a graduate of the University of Pennsylvania (Perelman) School of Medicine (1988). He received the St. Joseph’s Family Practice Resident’s Teaching Award for his contribution to the education of family practice residents and a C3 Cardiology Global Health Award for teaching nutritional science to cardiologists. Dr. Fuhrman also serves as the President of the Nutritional Research Foundation and is on the faculty of Northern Arizona University, Health Sciences division. His work and discoveries are published in medical journals, contributing to multiple ongoing nutritional studies with major research institutions across America.

A native of Yonkers, New York, Dr. Fuhrman is a former world-class figure skater, placing second in the United States National Pairs Championships in 1973 and third in the 1976 World Professional Pairs Skating Championship in Jaca, Spain. Dr. Fuhrman has served on sports medicine committees, advised professional and Olympic athletes, and lectured to athletic trainers and world-class athletes about maximizing performance and preventing injury.

In 2018 Dr. Fuhrman opened his Eat to Live Retreat in San Diego, where people from all over the world stay for extended periods to resolve food addiction, lose weight, and recover from serious medical conditions including cardiovascular disease, autoimmune disease, and more.

Is it the genes? Understanding the origins of the obesity epidemic

Dr. Michael Greger

Dr. Greger is a physician, New York Times bestselling author, and internationally recognized speaker on nutrition, food safety, and public health issues.

A founding member and Fellow of the American College of Lifestyle Medicine, Dr. Greger is licensed as a general practitioner specializing in clinical nutrition. He is a graduate of the Cornell University School of Agriculture and Tufts University School of Medicine. In 2017, Dr. Greger was honored with the ACLM Lifestyle Medicine Trailblazer Award and became a diplomat of the American Board of Lifestyle Medicine.

Both his latest books, How Not to Die and the How Not to Die Cookbook, became instant New York Times Best Sellers. 100% of all proceeds he has ever received from his books, DVDs, and speaking engagements have always and will always be donated to charity.

Taste and pleasure: how our senses influence what we eat

Dr. Paule Joseph

Paule Joseph, PhD, MBA, MS, FNP-BC, CTN-B, FAAN

Dr. Joseph is an Afro-Latina nurse scientist, educator, and philanthropist born and raised in Venezuela, South America. As an international expert in chemosensation and metabolic diseases, she bridges the intersections of nursing, science, nutrition, public health, policy, and health disparities. Dr. Joseph is a 2019 National Institutes of Health (NIH) Lasker Scholar and 2018 Distinguished Scholar. She is Chief of the Section of Sensory Science and Metabolism in the Division of Intramural Clinical and Biological Research at the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism, with a dual appointment at the National Institute of Nursing Research (NINR). She is the 2022-24 America Academy of Nursing Fellow at the National Academy of Medicine.

Dr. Joseph leads a multidimensional translational research program combining research and clinical practice focused on chemosensation (taste and smell). Dr. Joseph and her group are conducting pre-clinical, clinical, and translational studies that aim to improve the diagnosis, prevention, and management of chemosensory disorders and symptoms. Her research program seeks to understand neurological and molecular mechanisms underlying chemosensation (taste, smell & chemesthesis) and motivational pathways of ingestive behaviors in individuals with obesity and alcohol and substance use disorders. Since 2020, Dr. Joseph and her team began investigating the effects of the SARS-CoV-2 virus on the chemical senses and its post-acute sequelae. Dr. Joseph is one of the co-founders of the Global Consortium for Chemosensory Research (GCCR) aims to foster the advancement of chemosensory science at large, allowing the possibility to test larger samples of participants cross-culturally, strengthening the reliability and validity of chemosensory science across many domains. During the COVID-19 pandemic, the GCCR led studies in 35 different languages worldwide and showed that COVID-19 was associated with severe impairment of smell, taste, and chemesthesis. She has served as Principal Investigator or Associate Investigator on approximately 20 research projects. She has published over 80 peer-reviewed articles, several book chapters, and one textbook. She has been cited 1861 times. She has an H-Index: 21, I-10 Index: 34, and NIH iCITE Weighted RCR 187.68. Her research has been covered by several media outlets nationally and internationally, including the New York Times, NPR, The Atlantic, and Hippo Hive Latin-American, among others. Dr. Joseph has received numerous awards, including the highly competitive Ajinomoto Award for Young Investigators in Gustation from the Association for Chemoreception Sciences; the Johnson & Johnson American Association of Colleges of Nursing’s Minority Nurse Faculty Scholarship; and the Rockefeller University 2016 Heilbrunn Nurse Scholar Award. The National Minority Quality Forum selected her as one of 2020’s 40 Under 40 Leaders in Minority Health and that same year by the National Association of Hispanic Nurses’ as one of the 40 under 40 award winners. Dr. Joseph is recognized among the top emerging nurse scientists in the United States.

Dr. Joseph is a leader of national and global nonprofit organizations dedicated to decreasing health disparities and improving healthcare access in vulnerable communities. Her background as a nurse scientist and a woman of color has influenced her commitment to increasing diversity in STEM-related fields. Dr. Joseph is a co-founder of the Latino Nurses Network, which focuses on building a solid network of support for Latino nurse leaders to effect change in healthcare policy, education, and practice. She is an active member of the Society for the Advancement of Chicanos and Native Americans in Science, the National Association of Hispanic Nurses, and the Black Nurses Association. In addition, more recently, she has been instrumental in developing a mentorship program for the National Association of Hispanic Nurses. She is currently contributing to the same development for the National Hispanic Science Network. Other indications of her support for addressing racial and ethnic equity are her service as co-chair of the NIH Anti-racism Steering Committee Retention and service that encompasses the T (Transparency committee) in the UNITE Initiative to identify and address structural racism within the NIH-supported and the greater scientific community. These efforts led her to receive the 2022 NIH Director’s Award for extraordinary dedication, teamwork, and leadership in supporting NIH’s UNITE Initiative to address structural racism and promote racial and ethnic equity. Dr. Joseph is actively engaged in developing outreach and training initiatives to promote diversity, equity, and inclusion in biomedical research and training programs at NIH and internationally through her leadership of national and global nonprofits. She is the past Vice-President of the Amazing Grace Children’s Foundation based in Ghana and serves on the advisory board for the organization. Within the organization, she has led initiatives to decrease health disparities and to develop training opportunities for local students and clinicians. Additionally, she serves as the Director of Mentorship for the African Research Academy for Women based in Ghana and the USA. She is a Founding Strategic Advisor of the Smell and Taste Association of North America. Dr. Joseph’s clinical experience, research interests, leadership skills, and dedication to science, diversity, and health disparities have distinguished her as a prominent and emerging nurse scientist who will continue to positively change Society through her research, policy, and service work-centering diversity, equity, inclusion, access and belonging in the sciences.

Dr. Joseph received an Associate Degree in Applied Sciences in Nursing at Hostos Community College, a BSN from the College of New Rochelle, and an MS with a specialty as a Family Nurse Practitioner from Pace University. She completed a Ph.D. in nursing with a focus on genomics at the University of Pennsylvania and conducted her Ph.D. work at the Monell Chemical Senses Center. She then completed a Clinical and Translational Postdoctoral Fellowship focused on genomics, nutrition, and gastrointestinal diseases at the NINR, supported by the Office of Workforce Diversity. She recently completed an executive MBA from the Quantic School of Business and Technology. Dr. Joseph is a certified nurse practitioner with clinical privileges at the NIH Clinical Center and outside of NIH. Dr. Joseph is the second nurse in the country to receive the Lasker Clinical Scholars Award, a prestigious NIH, and the Lasker Foundation grant. She is a Fellow of the American Academy of Nursing, a Fellow of the New York Academy of Medicine, and a Fellow of the Transcultural Nursing Society.

From 420 to 155 pounds - conquering food addiction

Chuck Carroll

Chuck Carroll is host of the Physicians Committee’s popular “The Exam Room” podcast and known widely as The Weight Loss Champion, a name given to him by an NFL player for losing an incredible 275 pounds.

At just 5 feet 6 inches tall, Chuck weighed 420 pounds and had a 66-inch waist before radically changing his life.

Before that, like so many others, he tried and failed countless times to lose weight. Any success he achieved was short-lived as the weight came pouring back on and then some. At his heaviest, he was eating 10,000 calories every day.

Out of desperation, he decided to have weight loss surgery in 2009. Prior to the procedure he was convinced that it would become like all the other failed attempts to lose weight. Chuck was just 27 years old at the time and didn’t believe he would live to see 30. He thought at least he would go to his grave saying he tried everything.

But then the unexpected happened. He woke up from the surgery and never looked back.

Although a critical component, the procedure proved only to be the first step in his journey. In fact, he only attributes 10 percent of his long-term weight loss success to it. The rest he credits to a plant-based diet and changing his lifestyle!

By adopting a plant-based diet, he is no longer afraid of regaining the weight as he had so many times before — no more yo-yo dieting! He is thrilled that he is lowering his risk of cancer and Alzheimer’s Disease, both of which run rampant in his family. As a bonus, he is no longer spending massive amounts of money on medical expenses because of his optimum health!

The confidence he gained from the weight loss enabled him to pursue his dream of becoming a reporter where he covered sports and news for CBS and later NBC News Radio. He was also previously featured in PCRM’s Teaming Up 4 Health campaign where he had the opportunity to speak on Capitol Hill and share his remarkable journey.

Now he is delighted to be bringing his passion and talents to the Physicians Committee as host of The Exam Room and to show others that the impossible is possible — you can get healthy!