The effectiveness of including support people in a cognitive-behavioural weight loss maintenance program for obese adults: study rationale and design

Abstract

Objective: The well-documented finding that obese adults have a high likelihood of weight regain following participation in behavioural weight loss programs highlights the importance of developing more effective approaches for weight loss maintenance. One promising approach is to improve the quality of social support for effective weight control available to an obese individual by including support people in behavioural weight loss programs. This paper describes the rationale and design of a randomised controlled trial that evaluates the effectiveness of training support people to assist obese adults in their weight management. Design: The study entails a twoarm randomised controlled trial in which obese participants take part in a one-year (26-session) cognitive-behaviour therapy group weight management program including motivational interviewing strategies (CBT-MI). In one arm, participants receive CBT-MI alone, while in the second arm (CBT-MI-SP) participants also have a support person who attends 10 group sessions designed to teach effective skills for supporting an individual in healthy weight control. Assessments of anthropometric, medical, behavioural, psychological, and social functioning take place at pretreatment, post-treatment, and a one-year follow-up. Conclusions: By helping obese participants to increase and sustain their motivation and skills for weight control, the CBT-MI-SP approach of the current study has the potential to effectively help patients to achieve sustained weight loss while minimising the patient’s need for ongoing, intensive weight control treatment with its attendant costs.