What to Expect at a Medical Weight Loss Consultation in Lenexa
By Kelli Rausch, APRN, FNP-BC ÉLEVÉ Regenerative Aesthetics & Wellbeing — Lenexa, KS
If you’ve already tried the diets, the apps, the 5 a.m. workouts — and the scale still won’t move — walking into one more appointment about your weight can feel like setting yourself up to be disappointed again. I understand that. Most of the people who sit down across from me have been doing everything they were told to do.
A medical weight loss consultation is a different conversation. It isn’t a weigh-in and a lecture. It’s an evaluation — of your history, your labs, and what has actually been getting in your way. Here’s exactly how it goes.
You'll be talking to me — and I've been where you are
I’m Kelli Rausch, APRN, FNP-BC, and I own ÉLEVÉ. The person who reviews your labs, writes your plan, and adjusts your dose is the same person sitting with you at every visit. No handoff to a coach, no rotating provider, no call center.
There’s something else you should know before you come in: I’ve been where you are.
At my heaviest I was 320 pounds and a size 26. I’ve been through the part where you stop taking care of yourself and don’t know how to start again, and the part where you finally do. Years later, after a career change and a move to Kansas City, the weight crept back into the 180s — and in January 2024 I started GLP-1 therapy myself and came down to around 145.
I stopped in July 2024. Six months on it, total. I’ve been off it ever since — two years now — running consistently around 144.
I want to be careful with that, because it’s the outcome everyone hopes for and it is not what happens for everyone. Plenty of people find their appetite returns and some weight comes back — that’s true of most metabolic therapies, and anyone who promises you otherwise is selling something. What made the difference for me wasn’t the medication. It was what I learned while I was on it.
Here’s the honest part: the medication didn’t make me thin. It quieted the food noise long enough for me to finally learn how to eat. I still don’t do the gym. I’m a fast walker who pays attention to what she eats. I’m also a Nothing Bundt Cake girl who used to finish one before leaving the parking lot and now makes one last four days.
So when I tell you this isn’t a shortcut, I’m not saying it from behind a desk. I know the first-injection nerves, the nausea week, and the month-three plateau where the scale stops and your motivation goes with it. I also know what it takes past the medication — the protein, the walking, the honest look at sleep and stress.
That’s why I won’t oversell it to you. Weight is rarely a willpower problem — it’s hormones, thyroid, insulin, sleep, stress, and the medications you may already be taking. None of that gets sorted out by someone reading from a script, and none of it gets fixed by a vial alone.
First, your full health history
The visit starts with a real conversation about your background. Not a form you fill out in the lobby — a conversation.
At my weight loss clinic in Lenexa, I want to know:
- Every medication and supplement you’re currently taking (a surprising number of common prescriptions — antidepressants, beta-blockers, steroids, antihistamines — quietly work against weight loss)
- Your medical history, past surgeries, and family history of metabolic or thyroid disease
- How you’re actually sleeping, and what your stress load looks like day to day
- What you’ve already tried, what worked for a while, and where it fell apart
That last one matters more than people expect. If a program worked for you for four months and then stopped, that tells me something real about your physiology.
Then, your labs
First, your full health history
I don’t guess. Baseline lab work lets me see what’s actually happening metabolically instead of assuming.
I look at thyroid function, fasting insulin, A1c, vitamin D, B12, inflammatory markers, and hormones where it’s clinically appropriate. Labs regularly surface things people had no idea about — an underactive thyroid, insulin resistance, a hormone picture that’s been making every effort twice as hard as it needed to be.
For some patients, hormone replacement therapy is worth evaluating alongside metabolic health. BHRT isn’t a weight loss treatment on its own, and I won’t sell it that way. But when hormones are part of what’s going on, addressing them makes everything else you’re doing work better.
Your plan gets built on your data. Not a template.
Talking through your options — including medication
Once I understand your baseline, we build the plan together. That almost always includes nutrition guidance focused on protein and preserving lean muscle, because muscle is what protects your metabolism on the way down.
If prescription therapy is clinically appropriate for you, I work with compounded semaglutide and compounded tirzepatide, prepared individually for you by a state-licensed compounding pharmacy in Missouri — right across the state line, not shipped in from wherever a national telehealth company found the cheapest source. Which medication you’re on, and at what dose, is decided after your consultation and lab review, never before. Both work with your body’s own metabolic signaling to quiet the constant food noise, so the work you’re doing on nutrition and strength finally sticks. Neither one is magic, and I’ll never present it that way.
I start low and titrate based on how you respond. Most side effects are digestive — nausea, fullness, constipation — and most of them are manageable by how carefully we increase your dose. You’ll have a direct line to me the whole way.
How we structure the work together — how often we meet, how long we go, what support gets built in around the medication — depends on what you actually need. I offer several different options to fit different goals, timelines, and budgets, and we’ll walk through them at your consultation and pick the one that fits your life. You won’t be steered toward the biggest one.
That support can include wellness injections — B12, MICC, Lipo+, L-Carnitine, and vitamin D — chosen based on your labs and what your body is actually short on. I want to be straight about what these are: they’re supportive, not the engine. They don’t replace the medication, the protein, or the walking, and I won’t tell you a shot is going to melt fat off you. But if your vitamin D is in the basement or your B12 is low, correcting that tends to make the rest of the work feel less like pushing a boulder uphill.
Compounded medications are not FDA-approved and are not reviewed by the FDA for safety or effectiveness. They are prepared by a state-licensed compounding pharmacy and prescribed individually following a medical evaluation. Medical weight management is not appropriate for everyone. Individual results vary.
And an honest answer about whether this is right for you
Some people aren’t appropriate candidates. If that’s you, I’ll tell you plainly at the consultation and we’ll talk about what would help. I’d rather lose the sale than put you on something that isn’t right for your body.
That’s not a sales line. It’s how I want to be treated as a patient, so it’s how I practice.
One thing most clinics don't mention
Significant weight loss can change your face. As body fat comes down, many patients notice a loss of midface volume and some skin laxity — it’s common, and nobody warns you about it beforehand.
I bring it up early because you should be able to plan for it, not be surprised by it. Conservative filler to restore lost volume, or microneedling to support skin quality, can help — but only if and when you want it. It’s part of the conversation, not a condition of anything. Nothing about your weight loss plan depends on you saying yes to a single aesthetic treatment.
What to bring, and how long it takes
Plan for about an hour. Bring a list of your current medications and supplements, and any recent lab work from your primary care provider if you have it — no need to repeat tests we don’t need to repeat.
Come as you are. There’s no judgment in that room, and there’s no pressure to leave with a plan the same day.
Ready to talk about it?
If you’re tired of doing this alone and want an actual evaluation instead of another program, I’d like to meet you.
Schedule a consultation at ÉLEVÉ Regenerative Aesthetics & Wellbeing, 8801 Penrose Ln, Suite 106, Lenexa, KS 66219. You can also call or text 913-437-4747.
Serving Lenexa, Overland Park, and the greater Kansas City area. Veteran and active-duty discounts available.
Confidence Elevated. Beauty & Vitality Refined.
— Kelli 💜