Introduction:

in the search for products that allow or contribute to the loss of body weight with a minimum of adverse reactions, the use of various preparations of different origins has been considered, one of them being chitosan.

Objective:

to describe the usefulness of chitosan in the treatment of obesity and some of its comorbidities.

Methods:

a descriptive bibliographic review was carried out. Google and Google Scholar were used as search engines. Information from different databases was used. The keywords used were: chitosan; chitosan; chitosan; obesity; anti-obesity drugs (in English and Spanish). Articles were evaluated, which in general were less than 10 years old, in the referred languages and which by title dealt with the topic of study. 43 articles were referenced.

Results:

chitosan is a natural biopolymer of glucosamine, it is biodegradable, biocompatible, non-toxic, and has hypolipidemic, anti-inflammatory, antidiabetic, antioxidant biological effects, and as a nutritional supplement for weight loss, among other applications. However, the review of the literature does not support this latter approach, although its usefulness as an adjuvant in the treatment of obesity and the cardiometabolic comorbidities that usually accompany it is recognized.

Conclusions:

chitosan is a natural product that is not useful to obtain the long-awaited weight loss in obese patients. Although, it is useful as an adjuvant in its treatment, since it contributes to not increasing body weight and improves some of the cardiometabolic abnormalities associated with this disease.

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