Over the last decades there is a problem that has increased to the point of becoming public health. It is about obesity and although many people want to lose weight, in the end they do not achieve it. The reality is that it is not that simple and it is not enough to have the disposition but more elements are needed. Nor is it an aesthetic aspect but rather it has a direct relationship with more than a hundred diseases and ailments.
A growing problem
According to data from the World Health Organization (WHO), Obesity has reached epidemic proportions globally. Moreover, it is estimated that since 1975 this disease has tripled, achieving that in 2016, 1,900 million adults suffered from it, as well as 340 million children and adolescents.
Obesity is a multifactorial disease characterized by the abnormal accumulation of fat that generates a state of chronic inflammation in the body. In addition, it is the first step for other serious pathologies such as high blood pressure, type II diabetes, high levels of cholesterol and triglycerides, osteoarticular problems, risk of cancer, sleep apnea and cardiovascular problems.
The 10 steps to follow to lose weight
For their part, the role of health professionals is very important to achieve satisfactory results with their patients. For the same, the Mental Health magazine of the National Institute of Psychiatry “Ramón de la Fuente Muñiz” published an interesting article.
It is a decalogue to lose weight and the implications that both the mental part and health professionals have to achieve it. The indications mentioned are the following:
- The relationship between obesity and mental health requires the evaluation and treatment of the main mental health conditions that affect this population: depressive, anxiety and eating disorders.
- People with obesity can experience discrimination, which affects their emotional well-being and undermines their physical and mental health. “For this reason, we must promote strategies and programs to mitigate stigma in all its forms.”
- This discrimination can trigger physiological stress responses that alter neuroendocrine control and contribute to increased adiposity, with an increased risk of metabolic and cardiovascular comorbidities.
- Mental health professionals can provide valuable interventions for a comprehensive and multidisciplinary approach to overweight and obesity and reinforce strategies for changing habits aimed at achieving healthy lifestyles.
- Mental health professionals have to develop capacities to integrate multidisciplinary teams in the treatment of obesity, especially during the pre-surgical bariatric surgery protocol to design personalized treatments with a multidisciplinary approach.
- In the treatment of obesity, mental health professionals have to detect depressive or anxiety disorders, which require specialized diagnosis and treatment.
- For psychopharmacological treatment in overweight or obese patients, it is advisable, as far as possible, to choose those with a weight-neutral effect or those associated with weight loss.
- Since the presence of atypical depressive symptoms in patients with affective disorders contributes to weight gain, the choice of therapy should be guided by the clinical response that contributes to weight loss.
- Seeking to avoid stigmatizing patients with obesity, mental health professionals transmit messages of support to patients and include advice on healthy lifestyles in their interventions.
- The NutriCOI initiative based on the Nutricia Code is supported by mental health professionals through which they encourage the different academic sectors to behave in an ethical, transparent and professional manner in the face of possible conflicts of interest.