How a GP fixed herself and now tries to help others, with Dr Joanne McCormack

Dr Joanne McCormack is a UK General Practitioner (GP) and the named GP for children’s safeguarding for Warrington. Jo has been a GP for over 25 years in the Warrington area and ran her own practice for many years.

Jo has always been interested in weight and nutrition having wondered why she was following the advice and getting heavier and why the same was happening to her patients. Jo knew that the dietary guidelines didn’t work for her – she then realised that they didn’t work for her patients either. She came across Grain Brain by Dr David Perlmutter and tried his very low carb (<30g/day) programme for three months. She lost weight, felt great and became a real food/managed carb ‘zealot’ (to use her own words!)

In this first podcast, Jo and I talk about a wide variety of topics: Fat shaming – how do we protect individuals, while encouraging the whole population to reduce/avoid obesity? What is obesity trying to tell us? How Jo raises the “what do you eat?” issue in the typically short GP appointment and what she’s doing to tackle the problem in group sessions outside the appointment schedule. We close with a couple of case studies to inspire others who may be facing similar issues: an obese female and a fairly slim athlete who was shocked to be diagnosed with type 2 diabetes.

You can find more about Joanne at www.fatismyfriend.co.uk