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Spreading Himself Even Thinner

Maybe you’ve noticed. Randy Halfacre has dropped a few. Pounds, that is, and inches, and most importantly, two of his four medications. In fact, he’s feeling better than he has in years, thanks to Bee Healthy Medical Weight Loss & Wellness.“I feel like I’m 40,” Halfacre said. “My blood pressure and cholesterol numbers are within healthy parameters, and that’s the first time I can remember that happening in a long time.”

While losing 30 pounds and three inches in eight months truly is something to cheer, good health is more important to him and the Bee Healthy staff.  They knew his was a special and public case: As president/CEO of the Greater Lexington Chamber and Lexington’s mayor, Halfacre attends meetings throughout the day and at night. Those meetings often come with food and drink.

“He is surrounded by food,” said Dr. Allan Hicks, Bee Healthy’s supervising physician. “We realized our program would be an extra challenge for him.”

As with all Bee Healthy patients, Halfacre’s blood was drawn for staff to study and formulate a health plan. Lab work revealed slightly elevated cholesterol and moderately elevated triglycerides, for which he was already taking medication. To reduce the triglycerides, Hicks and Vickie Gore, Bee Healthy’s nurse practitioner, recommended Omega 3 fish oil. It seems to have made a difference. Halfacre’s triglycerides dropped from 224 in February to 128 by the end of August.

“Remarkable” is Gore’s comment. The fish oil wasn’t the only reason for the good news, she says. Halfacre’s healthier diet and increased exercise—he walks a mile and a half on a treadmill three times a week—helped too.

Gore is particular about the vitamins and supplements Bee Healthy recommends. After much research, she settled on Douglas Laboratories in Pittsburg for Bee Healthy’s physician-grade products, including the fish oil.

Weight loss aided Halfacre’s quest for improved health. “He was a good candidate to put on an appetite suppressant to help him minimize his meals and eat the right foods,” Hicks said. Phentermine was prescribed, which Halfacre took and is now weaning.

“I wasn’t as hungry,” he said. “I noticed I ate only half a sandwich at lunch instead of a whole one. Consequently, my stomach shrank and requires less food to feel full.”

Bee Healthy also suggested and administered weekly B12 injections. The injections include vitamin B12, which are natural to the body, as well as three amino acids that help target and break down fat cells, Gore explains. “The injections help increase one’s energy level, which assists in weight loss.”

Halfacre likes the extra energy. “That’s something I need due to my long days.”

Results were heartening, and pretty fast. “I’ve lost 10 pounds—actually 10.1 pounds,” he announced Feb. 22, less than a month after he started. “My pants aren’t tight anymore.”

He’d also lost three inches from his waist, and had started to change some habits. “Losing weight motivates you to lose more and it makes me focus on what I eat,” he noted. “I’m eating hardly any fried food.”

By April 25, Halfacre had dropped 16 pounds. “I don’t roll over my belt anymore,” he said. At the Chamber’s breakfast meeting in May, he jokingly posed for a photo—opening his jacket for a side view. “There’s no roll over that belt!”

He’s done so well he’s become the Bee Healthy “poster boy.” Gore says her patient has more confidence and energy, and that his lab results are more dramatic than his weight loss. “They’re excellent,” she says, adding that she may use them for a study she’s conducting.

“I think his success comes because of his commitment,” Gore said. “There is no magic pill you take; you have to believe you can do this. And it is a change—a lifestyle change. It teaches you to live in the real world and eat real foods.”

Halfacre plans to continue the B12 shots and taper off on the phentermine. His goal is around 215 pounds. “I’ve got a little more than 10 pounds to go,” he says. He has two goals for next year: “I don’t want to gain my weight back, and I want to be as healthy as a 30-year-old!”

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