Phone counseling effective in weight loss

New York, November 25: Hooked onto the phone? Well, it may help keep off pounds too, for a new American study suggests telephone counseling is just as effective in weight loss as face-to-face follow-up sessions.

The focus stratum of the study, the rural women, have fewer health options and support system is often far. Also, they have access to fewer medical and weight loss treatment centers than urban residents, thus raising their rates of obesity and in turn an array of obesity-related conditions like heart ailments and diabetes.

"Rural counties in the United States have higher rates of obesity, sedentary lifestyle and associated chronic diseases than non-rural areas, yet treatment of obesity in the rural population has received little research attention," the background information of the study featuring in the Nov. 24 issue of Archives of Internal Medicine, one of the JAMA/Archives journals, reads.

For the study, 234 obese women with an average weight of 212.5 pounds, hailing from the rural counties in Florida, were enrolled. Aged between 50 and 75, all participants had successfully completed a six-month weight loss program losing 22 pounds on average.

For a one year follow-up the women were randomly divided into three groups. While the first group received a bi-weekly 15-20 minute telephone counseling session, the second group went through a face-to-face one hour counseling session every two weeks. The third group received biweekly newsletters that provided diet and weight loss tips.

Follow-up analysis revealed that while participants in the telephone and face-to-face weight-loss-maintenance programs regained less weight (2.6 pounds on average), the participants who received biweekly group regained on an average 8.2 pounds.

Moreover, telephone counseling was the cheapest of the three ways.

"Our findings highlight the benefits of extended-care interventions and indicate that telephone counseling represents an effective and cost-efficient approach to the management of obesity in underserved rural settings," Michael G. Perri, study’s lead author and researcher at the University of Florida, Gainesville, averred.

Post weight loss management is as crucial as actual weight loss, researchers noted. It helps prevent erosion of gained health benefits.