Engaging primary care patients with existing online tools for weight loss: A pilot trial

Abstract

Objective: Free online tools show potential for promoting weight loss at a low cost, but there is limited evidence about how to effectively engage patients with them. To address this, a low-dose, flexible intervention was developed that aims to enhance weight-related discussions with primary care providers (PCPs) and engage patients with an organic (i.e., not researcher-created) weight loss-focused social media community and online self-monitoring tool. Feasibility and acceptability of the intervention was evaluated in a single-arm, 12-week pilot.Methods: PCPs were recruited at two clinics, then PCP's patients with upcoming appointments were identified and recruited. Patients received an interactive online kickoff before their scheduled primary care appointment, then 8 follow-up messages over 12 weeks via email or their electronic health record patient portal. Patients completed assessments at baseline, post-appointment, and week 12. Primary care providers and patients completed semi-structured interviews.Results: All PCPs approached enrolled (n = 6); patient recruitment was on track to meet the study goal prior to COVID-19 restrictions, and n = 27 patients enrolled.Patient satisfaction with the pre-appointment kickoff was high. Twenty-four patients reported discussing weight-related topics at their primary care appointment and all were satisfied with the discussion. Twenty-two patients completed 12-week assessments. Of these, 15 reported engaging with the self-monitoring tool and 9 with the social media community. Patient interviews revealed reasons for low social media community engagement, including perceived lack of fit. On average, patients with available data (n = 21) lost 2.4 � 4.1% of baseline weight, and 28.6% of these patients lost ≥3% of baseline weight. Primary care providers reported high intervention satisfaction. Conclusions:The intervention and trial design show potential, although additional strategies are needed to promote tool engagement.This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial License, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited and is not used for commercial purposes.

Exploring potential reach and representativeness of a self‐weighing weight gain prevention intervention in adults with overweight and obesity

“…Every day and lifetime experience of racism were measured using an 8‐item scale that measures experiences of discrimination from others 19 . Self‐reported motivation for improving diet, increasing exercise, and losing weight was measured using single items developed for use in past studies 20 . Participants were asked to evaluate their perceptions of the potential effectiveness for weight gain prevention regarding the self‐weighing intervention that was presented to them by answering questions from an adapted version of a validated measure of perceived treatment effectiveness for psychotherapy 21 .…”

“…19 Self-reported motivation for improving diet, increasing exercise, and losing weight was measured using single items developed for use in past studies. 20 Participants were asked to evaluate their perceptions of the potential effectiveness for weight gain prevention regarding the self-weighing intervention that was presented to them by answering questions from an adapted version of a validated measure of perceived treatment effectiveness for psychotherapy. 21 Participants also reported if they had a history of attending weight loss interventions and if they had tried to lose weight in the past year.…”