The Battle Against Obesity: Experts And Pharmacists Call For An Increased Role For Pharmacy Across The UK

Main Category: Obesity / Weight Loss / Fitness
Also Included In: Pharmacy / Pharmacist
Article Date: 16 May 2008 - 0:00 PDT

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New data revealed show that the pharmacy profession is increasingly recognising the potential to be involved in weight management, in a bid to stop the rising number of obese and overweight people.1 Results show 98 per cent of pharmacists in the UK believe that, with support and training, they are well placed to help people with their weight loss efforts.1 These data mirror the recent White Paper, Pharmacy in England, in which the Government recognises the major contribution that pharmacies could make towards healthcare delivery and public health improvement.2

Terry Maguire, a community pharmacist in Belfast and a fellow of the Royal Pharmaceutical Society of Great Britain who is championing a pilot programme that is assessing the impact of a pharmacy based obesity service in Coventry, UK says: "As possibly the biggest public and personal health threat to the UK today, pharmacy is an under-utilised resource that could be tackling obesity, providing ongoing advice and valuable behavioural change support, direct to the general public. The obesity 'epidemic' is, as yet, unabated and we urgently need to look at broadening our options to help people lose weight. What we are currently doing is not enough."

Supporting the findings, European experts at the 16th European Conference of Obesity (ECO) in Geneva, Switzerland, met today to discuss the future role of pharmacy and argued that 'many hands make light work' when it comes to tackling such a huge public health issue in the UK where:

- Approximately 65 per cent of men and 55 per cent of women are either overweight or obese3
- 40 per cent of adults are actively trying to lose weight 4
- 63 per cent of those that feel overweight have done so for over three years.5

The new survey data, released today, suggest that the pharmacy profession is well placed to provide the support needed to help people manage their weight. Of the UK pharmacists surveyed:

- 94 per cent think that guidance on healthy eating should be provided1
- 94 per cent think they should offer advice on weight loss medication1
- 92 per cent think they should give advice on behavioural change.1

Evidence suggests that providing behavioural support to people increases the chance of successful weight loss.6

Furthermore, the UK general public shows the strongest support across Europe for allowing pharmacies to offer more services.7

"There is a lot that can be learnt from other public health areas, like smoking quit-rates for example, where pharmacists have supported thousands of people to stop smoking. We would therefore welcome the opportunity for overweight and obese people to visit their pharmacist for help to change their behaviour, lose weight and improve their overall health. Losing just 5-10 per cent of your body weight will have a major improvement on the problems caused by obesity; weight reductions of 5-10 kg, for example, have been shown to improve back and joint pain, diabetes, symptoms of breathlessness and sleep apnoea" commented Dr David Haslam GP and Clinical Director of the National Obesity Forum (NOF).

Additional data presented for the first time at ECO highlight a successful approach to weight loss from the US. Results showed that overweight and obese adults in the US who purchased orlistat 60 mg, a clinically-proven medication available without prescription in the US and who had access to a tailored, behavioural, online support programme lost on average, 4.3 per cent of their original body weight after twelve weeks.8 Furthermore, data from clinical trials with orlistat 60 mg show that people who responded well to treatment at twelve weeks continued to do well when weight loss was measured at six or twelve months.9 This suggests that encouraging people in their weight loss effort during the first few weeks of treatment may improve the longer term treatment outcome.

Dr Terry Maguire, community pharmacist in Belfast, past-president of the Pharmaceutical Society of Northern Ireland and a Fellow of both the Pharmaceutical Society of Ireland and the Royal Pharmaceutical Society of Great Britain.

Dr David Haslam is a GP and Physician in Obesity Medicine at the Centre for Obesity Research at Luton and Dunstable Hospital and Clinical Director of the National Obesity Forum (NOF). He is Chair of the NOF's Charity Foundations, a member of the Counterweight Board, Visiting Lecturer at Chester University and Visiting Fellow at the Postgraduate Medical School of Hertfordshire and Bedfordshire.

About the pharmacy survey released today

The survey was carried out by ICM Research in April 2008 among a total of 350 pharmacists in the UK and six other European countries.

About GlaxoSmithKline Consumer Healthcare

GlaxoSmithKline (GSK), one of the world's leading research-based pharmaceutical and healthcare companies, is committed to improving the quality of human life by enabling people to do more, feel better and live longer.

The consumer healthcare business brings an added dynamic dimension to our company, with well known brands like Panadol, NiQuitin, Sensodyne and Aquafresh among others but, as with all our products, the driving force behind our consumer healthcare business is science. With four dedicated consumer healthcare R&D centres, the business takes scientific innovation as seriously as marketing excellence and offers leading-edge capability in both. GSK recently launched alli in the US, the first FDA approved OTC product for weight loss,and is committed to tackling the public health burden of obesity globally.
For company information, please visit http://www.gsk.com.

References

1. Survey among 350 pharmacists in Europe, across Czech Republic, Germany, France, Poland, Slovakia, Switzerland and the UK. ICM Research. 2008.

2. Pharmacy in England. Building on strengths - delivering the future. Department of Health. 2008.

3. Health Survey for England 2003. National Centre for Social Research, Department of Epidemiology and Public Health at the Royal Free and University College Medical School. Commissioned by Department of Health. Department of Health. December 2004.

4. GB TGI, BMRB Autumn 2003-Q4 2007. Mintel International Group Ltd.

5. Quantitative obesity market research. BMRB Enlightenment. 2008

6. Heshka S, Anderson J et al. Weight loss with self-help compared with a structured commercial program. JAMA. 2003; 289: 1792-1798.

7. Greater Expectations. Pharmacy Based Helathcare - The Future for Europe? The London School of Pharmacy. University of London. 2007.

8. Daggy B, Schwartz SM et al. Demographics, weight loss and satisfaction results for consumers enrolled in the online behavioural support program for non-prescription 60 mg orlistat. Poster at the 16th European Congress on Obesity (ECO), Geneva, Switzerland. 14-17 May 2008.

9. Bacon TH, Schwartz SM et al. Evaluation of early weight loss measures as predictors for successful treatment with orlistat 60 mg. Poster at the 16th European Congress on Obesity (ECO), Geneva, Switzerland. 14-17 May 2008.

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