Nature Reviews Disease Primer: Obesity

Obesity has a profound impact on quality of life, even in seemingly healthy individuals. Diet, physical activity or exercise and lifestyle changes are the cornerstones of obesity treatment, but medical treatment and bariatric surgery are becoming important. Clinicians and other health care professionals are often ill-equipped to address the important environmental and socioeconomic drivers of the current obesity epidemic.

“It is not the diet; it is the mental part we need help with.”A multilevelanalysis of psychological, emotional, and social well-being in obesity

This research, in which Can-Change member Dr. Michael Vallis participated, explored the psychological, emotional, and social experiences of individuals living with obesity, and perceptions of health care providers. A theoretical thematic analysis was conducted using two theoretical frameworks applied to transcripts from a previous qualitative study.