Opportunities to Fight Obesity May Become More Accessible

Today, we talk a lot about the causes of obesity and the methods that may be used to treat obesity. However, we might be missing some important opportunities to combat the disease during its early stages. Moreover, accessing those opportunities may become easier to do.

A study, entitled “Adult Obesity and Office-based Quality of Care in the United States,” discussed in a recent issue of the journal, Obesity, indicates that opportunities to treat obesity during patient visits to health care providers are commonly missed. For example, when an obese patient goes in for a physician visit, the patient is often not provided counseling on weight loss methods. And this absence of counseling leads to poor health and higher health care costs.

We think that patient visits provide an opportunity for physicians, especially primary care physicians, to improve the health of many patients. But in order for primary care physicians to take advantage of this opportunity, barriers that inhibit weight loss counseling must be broken down. And these barriers exist from both the patients' and the physicians' perspective.

For example, a 2007 report asserted that many health care providers feel that patients are obese because patients don’t effectively use self-control. And many patients believe that it’s up to them to control their weight. Thus many patients don’t talk with their health care provider about methods to combat obesity.

Although these and other barriers do exist, we believe that rising health care costs will cause more people to recognize the importance of maintaining a healthy weight. And this will cause more people to talk with their health care providers -- especially primary care physicians -- about weight management. Further, more people will talk with their providers about weight management, because their employers will urge them to do so.

Indeed, a July 2009 Wall Street Journal article entitled, “When All Else Fails: Forcing Workers Into Healthy Habits,” reported that some companies are now compelling their employees to live healthier lifestyles, because if employees live healthier lifestyles, this will lower a company's health care costs. A healthy lifestyle includes getting periodic physicals, sticking to a healthy diet, and maintaining a healthy weight.

We believe that there will be an increasing focus on living a healthier lifestyle, by primary care physicians and by patients. And this increasing focus offers an opportunity for all weight loss providers, especially medical weight loss providers. These weight loss experts can form strategic alliances with primary care physicians and others who work with persons needing to lose or maintain a healthy weight.

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Tags: environmental scanning, swot analysis, bariatric industry, strategic management, weight loss industry, bariatric marketing