Welcome to Holland Clinic

Thank you for giving this website your attention and welcome.

If you are like most people struggling with weight, you have probably tried
many diets, many supplements and a whole lot of gimmicks. You have probably
found, like everyone, that it's a lot easier to buy a promise of weight loss than
to achieve it as a reality. You have probably felt a failure many times over and
you have likely spent more money than you care to admit. It is perhaps cold
consolation that you are not alone.

The truth, of course, is that there are no weight loss miracles. If any of the
thousands of diets, supplements and books that flood the market ever really
worked, you would already know it, already be thin and certainly not wasting
your time reading this.

I have no miracles to promise, but I do offer hope along with the most modern
medical therapy available. Medical science has made and continues to make
real progress in the treatment of obesity. Long-term weight loss is truly
possible, but, with or without medical help, it still requires long-term changes in
your life. Most of my patients start out believing that they are incapable of real
and lasting change; they cite as evidence for this their own past weight loss
"failures". Men and women who have achieved incredible success in other areas
of life believe that with weight they are abject failures. Not only is this tragic,
it is self-fulfilling. Who among us is going to work to achieve a goal we believe
unreachable?

Obesity is a disease, not a character flaw. It responds to livable and sustained
lifestyle modification and not to hocus-pocus or self-flagellation. Obesity is also
a chronic disease, just like diabetes, just like high blood pressure. Obesity
doesn't happen for only, say, two years and then just go away. But, just like
diabetes, just like hypertension, obesity can be managed. Such management is
not a cure, but it does mean that the serious health risks of obesity can be
reduced through long-term weight loss. That is the focus of my work.

I treat obesity medically and in many cases, when appropriate, I treat it with
medications. I treat obesity didactically, by working with every patient I see to
make sensible life-style changes appropriate for that person's health. I treat
obesity as a human being who stands in judgement of nobody else lest he
himself be judged. Obesity is a brutal disease that destroys human lives. It
deserves better treatment than a pretty lie and frankly, so do you. I take very
seriously the trust people place in the title of "physician" and work daily to
honor it.

This website is a work in progress. I approach it with high hopes and limited
time. Everything you see and read here is written by me (except when I am
explictly quoting). I have no web-design firm and no marketing agency. This all
me and I offer this website as an informational resource to my patients and to
the public but with a caveat: the information herein is solely that: information.
It is NOT medical advice. I can only offer that to patients whom I have talked
with and examined.

To the left and right of each page you will find links to information about my
practice and about the science and medicine of weight loss. Some of these
links are innactive at the moment, but I am adding content daily, so please be
patient. In the meantime, and always, I stand ready to assist you by telephone
or in person. Your time today reading this is my honor, and I hope it proves
worth your while.

Mark J Holland MD
May 27, 2010
Albuquerque, NM