Tag: primary care

Successful Weight Loss Counseling with Both In-Clinic and Remote Primary Care Visits

Primary healthcare, even in under-resources rural settings, has the capacity to offer effective weight loss counseling through different types of patient visits

WeightControl.com Interview with:
Christie A. Befort, Ph.D., Professor
Associate Director, Cancer Prevention and Control
Co-Leader, Cancer Control and Population Health Program
KU Cancer Center

WeightControl.com:  What is the background for this study?

Response: Primary care clinics are an important place for patients to get help with weight loss, especially for those who are at risk from obesity-related health complications or who have other medical conditions that may make weight loss more difficult.  This is especially true in remote rural areas where obesity prevalence is higher and there is less access to effective programs.

WeightControl.com: What are the main findings?

Response: Rural primary care clinics are able to offer weight loss counseling to their patients with clinically meaningful long-term weight loss after 2 years for approximately 2 out of 5 patients.  In-clinic group visits have a small advantage over in-clinic individual visits for weight loss outcomes.

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Weight Loss in Low Income Patients in Primary Care Settings

Clinically significant weight loss is possible in underserved, low-income patients in primary care settings.

WeightControl.com Interview with:
Peter Katzmarzyk, Ph.D., FACSM, FAHA, FTOS
Professor and Marie Edana Corcoran Endowed Chair
Pediatric Obesity and Diabetes
Assoc Exec Dir for Population and Public Health Sciences
Pennington Biomedical Research Center
Baton Rouge, LA

WeightControl.com:  What is the background for this study?

Response: Obesity remains one of the greatest public health threats, and there is good evidence that intensive lifestyle interventions should be a primary approach to obesity management and treatment. However, there has been minimal uptake of obesity treatment approaches in primary care, which is the cornerstone of medicine in the US.

WeightControl.com: What are the main findings?

Response: We developed an intervention to reduce calorie intake and increase physical activity that was delivered by health coaches embedded in primary care clinics. The sample was diverse with a large percentage of low-income and African American patients. The results demonstrated that patients in the intensive lifestyle intervention lost approximately 5% of their initial body weight, compared to patients in usual care who lost about 0.5% of their body weight. These weight loss differences between the two groups were maintained out to 2 years, which demonstrates the durability of the intervention.    

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