A Health Lesson from Oz

Dr. Mehmet Oz, a leading cardio surgeon and heart doctor in this country, was a guest on Oprah the other day—and it was an enlightening experience indeed!

Yes, I actually sat through an Oprah show because he was on, and he wasn’t her typical ordinary run-of-the-mill guest. This was a well-known doctor, and he had lots to say about coronary artery disease, heart disease, plaque, hard arteries, and the like. He even brought things for show-and-tell, such as hearts in various stages of health and decay, along with arteries, livers, new heart imaging technology, and showed an organ that didn’t look like an organ at all—it looked more like a stretched blob of fibrous fat.

“This is the organ responsible for obesity,” he said. I was all ears, ready with the notepad. Then a commercial break came. When they returned, he held it up, stretched it out, and told us it was called the OMENTUM, and it was responsible for fat storage in the abdomen. Naturally, I hit Google when all was said and done.

After perusing a definition and some pictures, (more pictures), and putting together the information I already had on good and bad fats, I deduced that this organ (actually two halves of an organ) is where obesity takes place. It’s also the starting place for several fat-related diseases. The omentum is susceptible to cancer, according to my mother-in-law’s old health record information—she was diagnosed with ovarian cancer in 2002, and she had a radical hysterectomy, appendectomy, and partial omentumectomy to try to remove some of her cancer. She lost her battle in 2004.

This, at least in part, explains why some cancer victims experience a sudden, unexplained weight loss—a telltale sign of cancer somewhere in the body. Cancer feeds on sugars, and fat gets released (and converted to sugars) to provide a source of energy, keeping the body (and unfortunately, the cancer) alive.

By adhering to a “good fats” diet, you are cleaning out your omentum of excess fats that are deleterious to your health. An overstuffed omentum leads to heart and vascular ailments of all sorts, not to mention triglyceride problems (fat in the blood), and eventual liver and kidney woes from trying to filter all this junk out of your body.

During liposuction, the omentum gets melted and sucked away, and people pay good money for this! Thank God it grows back, and that’s your second chance to take better care of it—or you can start now by incorporating good fats and exercise into your life.

So take a cue from Oprah and Oz—keep up your momentum to care for your omentum, and consume only good fats. Your abdomen will thank you for it, and so will the mirror.

My “good fats” article.