Obesity has skyrocketed to the forefront as a major contributor to the burden of chronic diseases. For the management and prevention of obesity, the Canadian Clinical Practice Guidelines recommend a lifestyle intervention. This includes dietary counselling, behaviour modification, and physical activity. With so many medically supervised weight loss on the market, the majority of them focus on low-calorie diets and general exercise recommendations. Most aren’t tailored to the individual and aren’t delivered by medical professionals. In all aspects of an individual’s life, such as lifestyle, sleep, mental health, and behaviours, an interdisciplinary team that consists of highly trained healthcare professionals has the ability to provide medically sound and safe advice. A clinically managed weight loss programme is defined as one that is supervised by a team that includes a dietitian, an exercise professional, a psychologist, and/or a physician or nurse practitioner.
It’s difficult to say whether clinically managedweight loss programmes are effective because the literature on the subject is limited. As a result, the goal of this systematic review is to compare clinically managed weight loss programmes with physician or nurse practitioner oversight to non-clinically managed weight loss programmes without a doctor or nurse practitioner supervision in adults who are overweight or obese. Low-calorie diets are the focus of most weight loss programmes, which rarely include medical supervision.
How they work?
Weight loss programmes like Weight Watchers, Jenny Craig, and Nutrisystems include nutrition, physical activity, and behavioural strategies, but they are not personalised for each person or administered by healthcare professionals. A weight management programme should include a nutrition health professional, an exercise professional, and a clinical psychologist, according to the 2006 CCPG. With an interdisciplinary team like this, all aspects of a person’s life are taken into account (i.e., lifestyle, sleep, mental health, behaviors). A clinically managed weight loss programme is one that is overseen by a physician or nurse practitioner (prescriber) and directed by dietitians, exercise professionals, and/or psychologists.
Throughout the weight loss programme, clinicians can actively monitor a participant’s health and potentially adjust medications. An interdisciplinary intervention with physician oversight resulted in greater and more clinically significant weight loss, according to a study by Tapsell and Neale.
Conclusion
Not all of these programmes include exercise, and the majority of them lack physician oversight and customization. Because clinicians are highly trained professionals with the ability to prescribe or adjust medications as well as provide medically sound and safe advice, clinician oversight may provide an additional benefit.