Dr. Ken Hassen: When we talk about dietary supports for weight-loss, there are numerous out there. I mean, it’s a big, big enterprise. Essentially, there’s some confusion here. Something that creates energy can be artificial or it can be of a natural nature. What’s an example? Well, I love coffee, I drink lots of coffee. I think it tastes great and it also gives me a boost when I need it. I understand, I recognize that it’s a temporary type of energy. Now coffee can make you jump around and move around so that you’re burning off more calories. It can be more beneficial than taking a cheeseburger. But essentially, if you think in terms of the fact that this is an artificial stimulant and that it is not going to have a long-term net effect that affects the organism favorably. Carnitine, on the other hand, helps to burn fats, optimizes fat use in the cell. What does that mean? We spoke before about the way fat is burned in an oven in the cell, called the mitochondria. Now when you cook in an oven you get a certain amount of smoke. If you use that same analogy at the cellular level you get smoke when you cook fats in the mitochondria and that smoke is kind of like free radicals. It does damage to the cell and that damage can slow down or be a cause for energy not being created properly. But carnitine helps to escort those wastes out. So essentially, it’s creating an environment, a healthy environment for not only burning nutrients such as fat, but also of removing the waste products that can further hamper the cell to create energy. That energy is going to be what it takes to get you up off of the couch, to actually move, to do some exercise on your own. And so consequently, it’s more of a natural type of energy creation. You don’t have the jitteriness that you have with some of these other dietary aids. And here again, it’s dependent a lot on everything else that you do in your program. You know, taking carnitine alone is not going to save the day. You need to have sufficient quantities of good quality water and you need to have a good balanced diet and you need to think in terms of moderation and balance.