SUMMARY
As a physician-scientist, Maria (Daniela) D. Hurtado Andrade, M.D., Ph.D., has a research goal to cure obesity. To this end, her training and research career have evolved around understanding and applying new knowledge to develop practical solutions to reduce obesity and its metabolic complications.
The highly variable response to weight-loss interventions demonstrates that the one-treatment-fits-all model of care has failed people living with obesity. As a result, the future of obesity treatment is in personalizing treatment options. To facilitate the generation of this new knowledge, Dr. Hurtado has focused her clinical and research efforts on specific populations: perimenopausal women and survivors of breast cancer.
Focus areas
- Obesity precision medicine. Dr. Hurtado is part of Mayo Clinic's Precision Medicine for Obesity Laboratory. Research in the lab aims at understanding the pathophysiologic mechanisms underlying obesity and how these mechanisms differ among people living with this disease. The overarching goal is to develop personalized interventions to improve weight-loss outcomes. These include lifestyle, behavioral, pharmacological, endoscopic and surgical interventions.
- Sex differences in obesity. In most populations, the prevalence of obesity is generally greater in women than in men. In the United States, although there is no difference in the obesity prevalence between sexes, epidemiologic trends demonstrate that women are almost twice as likely as men to be affected by severe obesity — defined as having a body mass index of over 40 kg/m2. Dr. Hurtado is interested in understanding the physiological mechanisms that determine these differences. She particularly focuses on the role of ovarian hormones on energy balance.
- Obesity management in survivors of breast cancer. Breast cancer survival rates have improved dramatically in the past few decades. This is due to earlier detection and advances in therapeutics. However, people who survive breast cancer are now dying of cardiovascular disease at unprecedented rates. Overweight and obesity contribute to the development of cardiometabolic risk factors that lead to cardiovascular disease and mortality. Dr. Hurtado's research focuses on identifying the factors that predict weight gain in people who survive breast cancer, as weight gain is a common concern in this population. She is ultimately interested in developing strategic interventions to prevent weight gain or to treat excess adiposity. By doing so, she aims to decrease the risk of developing cardiometabolic disease in this population, and to improve health and quality of survival.
- Rare genetic disorders of obesity. Dr. Hurtado's interests have evolved around the brain's regulation of energy intake. As such, she has started investigating the effect that variants of genes involved in the leptin-melanocortin pathway have on weight-loss response to pharmacological, endoscopic and surgical interventions.
Significance to patient care
Obesity is the No.1 chronic disease in the U.S. The highly variable response to weight-loss interventions demonstrates that the one-treatment-fits-all model of care has failed people living with obesity. As a result, the future of obesity treatment is in personalized options for people. To develop personalized interventions for obesity, Dr. Hurtado focuses on identifying and characterizing the mechanisms driving its heterogenous pathophysiology. To facilitate the generation of this knowledge, Dr. Hurtado has taken advantage of her clinical and research experiences to focus her efforts on a specific population: women with high cardiometabolic risk factors that lead to cardiovascular disease and increased cardiovascular mortality.
Professional highlights
- Editorial board member, Obesity Pillars, 2021-present.
- Member, Maintenance of Certification Committee, American Board of Obesity Medicine, 2021-present.
- Spokesperson, The Obesity Society Spokesperson Network, 2021-present.
- Recipient, Women's Health Research Center and Center for Women's Health Pilot Grant Award, Mayo Clinic, 2022.
- Committee member, University of Wisconsin-La Crosse/Mayo Clinic Health System Southwest Wisconsin Research Coordinating Committee, 2020-2022.
- Education chair, Mayo Clinic Fellows Association, 2018-2019.
- Recipient, Endocrine Fellows Foundation Research Grant, 2018.
- Recipient, Stephenson's Research Award, Mayo Clinic Division of Endocrinology, Diabetes, Metabolism, and Nutrition, 2017.
- Recipient, Outstanding Achievement Award, University of Florida College of Medicine, 2010.