Dr. Marc Erlitz is a Phi Beta Kappa graduate of the University of Rochester. He earned his MD degree from New York’s Albert Einstein College of Medicine and completed his specialty training in anesthesiology at the University of Washington, where he became chief resident. He is a diplomat of the American Board of Anesthesiology. After serving as chairman of the Department of Anesthesiology at Valley Medical Center for many years he, along with colleagues Ronald Abrams and James Scurlock, established one of the first free-standing ambulatory surgical centers in Washington State. For many years he traveled throughout the U.S. surveying health care institutions for the Accreditation Association for Ambulatory Health Care and now dedicates his entire practice to out-patient surgical anesthesia. He is frequently called upon to share his expertise in managing the special challenges of providing anesthesia care for patients undergoing surgical treatment for obesity and is passionate about making each patient’s surgical journey as safe and pleasant as possible.
This wildly popular drug is a synthetic form of GLP-1 (glucagon-like peptide-1), a hormone that regulates blood sugar and curbs appetite. But few know the unusual origin of this most modern therapy.