Helping Patients Work Towards A Healthy Weight

Main Category: Obesity / Weight Loss / Fitness
Article Date: 15 Jan 2009 - 3:00 PDT

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With obesity one of the most significant causes of death and disease in Australia, The Royal Australian College of General Practitioners (RACGP), in collaboration with the Heart Foundation, has launched a new online learning module that will boost the skills of general practitioners (GPs) and practice nurses in supporting overweight and obese people to work towards a healthy weight.

The activity, called Managing weight, has been developed through an educational grant from the Heart Foundation funded by the NSW Health Department. The learning activity is now available through the RACGP's online education portal gplearning at http://www.gplearning.com.au and Category 2 QA&CPD points apply for GPs.

"Achieving and maintaining a healthy weight is an important part of living a healthy lifestyle. There is overwhelming evidence that being overweight or obese is associated with a range of diseases and conditions, such as cardiovascular disease, type 2 diabetes, dyslipidaemia - a disruption in the amount of lipids in the blood - and osteoarthritis," said Dr Chris Mitchell, RACGP President, and GP in Northern NSW.

"Patients who are overweight or obese often seek the advice of their GP to help them move towards a healthier weight and to manage the health issues associated with their weight. A first port of call for the Australian community, GPs play an important role in health promotion, addressing the benefits of physical activity and the need for good nutrition, as part of a healthy lifestyle," said Dr Chris Mitchell.

This new education module provides an interactive and practical approach to supporting our patients in achieving a healthy weight in the general practice setting. As it is available online, GPs can complete this learning activity anywhere at any time.

At the end of this module participants should be able to:

- incorporate knowledge of nutrition recommendations for healthy adults based on the Australian Guide to Healthy Eating, and specific recommendations in weight management

- promote greater self-management skills in patients who are overweight

- incorporate information on the health benefits of a healthy weight and the risks of being overweight into patient consultations

- facilitate patient skills to make dietary and activity changes using appropriate behaviour change techniques, including assessing readiness to change (stage of change), motivational interviewing, goal setting and self-monitoring

- implement practice system changes to ensure a consistent and thorough approach to nutrition and physical activity, through asking and recording relevant dietary and physical activity information to identify those patients who are at risk

- advise on recommended portion sizes of foods such as fruit and vegetables

- advise on fat content of a diet

- incorporate knowledge of the health benefits of physical activity into patient consultations

- identify which patients with medical conditions are at risk if they start an unsupervised physical activity program

- identify appropriate forms of physical activity for at-risk patients

- identify symptoms which indicate that a particular physical activity session should be terminated

- demonstrate knowledge of the barriers to becoming more physically active, and an understanding of how much physical activity is needed to show health benefits

- identify the role of the dietitian and formulate meaningful referrals

- refer patients, when appropriate, to support services and physical activity programs

The learning activity Managing weight consists of five mini-case studies exploring the management of patients who are overweight, morbidly obese or who present with comorbidities (one or more disorders or diseases in addition to a primary disease or disorder) within the general practice setting.

This activity is part of the Implementing Lifestyle Change series, which has been developed through a partnership between the RACGP and the Heart Foundation. These activities can be completed alone, for RACGP QA&CPD Category 2 points, or as a complete ALM (active learning module) for Category 1 points.

For more information about the new online activity, visit http://www.gplearning.com.au.

The Royal Australian College of General Practitioners (RACGP) is responsible for maintaining standards for quality clinical practice, education and training, and research in Australian general practice. The RACGP has the largest general practitioner membership of any medical organisation in Australia and represents the majority of Australia's general practitioners.

Royal Australian College of General Practitioners

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