Study Participant Loses 65 Pounds, One Step at a Time

When Edward Kellatis enrolled in THE BRIDGE PROJECT study at South Pointe Hospital, he had difficulty walking up one flight of stairs in his two-story home. Today, after nearly a year in the study, "I take the stairs a lot now. I do 10 to 12 flights of stairs a day," he says.

As a caretaker for his wife, Marisa, he says he is grateful for the study's requirements of regular exercise and healthy eating. For instance, not long ago, when his wife came home from a hospital stay, "I had to help her get out of a chair and I hurt my back. Now, it's no problem."

Edward, 61, a retired illustrator, first learned of THE BRIDGE PROJECT during an appointment with Matthew Kampert, DO, who established the study with the help of Debasis Sahoo, MD, a pulmonary specialist on the staff of the Cleveland Clinic Respiratory Institute. The name is an acronym for: "Targeted Healthcare Efforts to Bridge Resources, Improve the Development of Guideline-Based Exercise Prescription and Reduce Obesity by Joining Education, Community and Technology."

"It sounded really good to me because a couple of months before, I was helping a friend lug a heavy air conditioner up the stairs, and the way I felt told me I needed to work out," he says. "I thought it was time."

At 6 feet tall and 268 pounds, he was feeling sluggish, he says. "My knees used to ache. I thought I was just getting old. But really, I just needed to get into shape."

As he does with all of his patients in the study, Dr. Kampert required Edward to take the few flights of stairs to each appointment.

"If they take the elevator, I make them go back down and come up the stairs," Dr. Kampert says. "I put signs behind the door at the top of the stairs, and if Edward didn't read them, he'd have to go back down and come up the stairs. People learn to make choices, like taking the stairs, parking farther away — changing the way they think. Edward noticed that as he was taking the stairs more often, he had more strength. His quality of life improved."

Initially, Edward didn't have any expectations for how he might do. "I just thought it would be good to get back into shape and see if I would feel better. I was watching my two older brothers and all their health challenges, and I thought, 'I don't want to get my knees replaced. I think I'll work out.'"

He surprised himself. "The first 24 pounds came off well, and now, I'm working on the next."

His biggest challenge was establishing a workout schedule, he says. "Life tends to get in the way," he says. Now, regular exercise is his main satisfaction. "It gives me something to do during the day."

In addition, he restricts his meal times to between noon and 6 p.m. "I don't have any problems with it," he says. "I was on a good diet before, but my main problem was snacking at night."

Edward says he plans to continue his new lifestyle after the study is over. "I feel much better about myself than I did before. It's really been a big change. I was able to cut my blood pressure medication in half after the third or fourth month, and a month-and-a-half later, I stopped it." His goal now is a total loss of 65 pounds, to achieve a normal BMI.

He finds that he is more alert and energetic and has "a much more positive attitude," which recently led to bringing home a puppy. He didn't consider that before, he says, because he worried about his ability to carry a puppy up and down the stairs.

Even more surprising, he says, is that he completed three 5K events this year.

"I figured that if I could do it on the treadmill, I could do it in real life," he says. "In one, I was the second-to-last in my age group. I didn't run -- I walked really fast -- and I did a 5K in 47 minutes. I've never been a person who wanted to run a mile, let alone a race, and now I try to do four miles on the treadmill every day. Except on the weekend. I take a day off."