14 DAY TRIAL // If you have a weight problem and you want to do something about it, the best place to start with is by seeking a good doctor, with a communication style that can motivate you, a new study suggests.
Though it’s not really news that what our doctors tell us can have a positive or negative impact on us, especially if it’s about weight, this recent study shows that, if you have to choose, you should always go for the well-spoken physician.
Or, as Diet-Blog puts it, if you can choose between Dr. Green of “ER” and Dr. House of “House M.D,” make sure you avoid the latter because you have better chances of losing weight with the former.
As fans of these two shows must know, while Dr. Green would go out of his way to make what he has to tell his patient more bearable, Dr. House is the exact opposite, being as subtle as an elephant in a China shop, as the saying goes.
Though “tough love” may work wonders at times, this new study shows it’s best to just go with “love” simply.
For the study, researchers recorded what 40 doctors (primary care) talked to 461 overweight patients over an 18-month period. Neither group knew what the research was for.
The idea was to determine how much time doctors spent talking to their patients about their weight, the possible health implications and, most importantly, how these reacted to being told these things.
While it has been shown that neither patients who were counseled nor those who weren’t lost any weight, chances for the former group to do so in the following three months were actually bigger if they also had a doctor who motivated them.
“Doctors discussed weight with patients in 69% of cases. Doctors spent an average of 3.5 minutes discussing diet and weight issues – about 15% of the visit,” Diet-Blog further writes of the findings.
“Patients whose doctors talked about diet and weight loss in a more motivational fashion, using predominantly reflective or empathic statements, were much more likely to lose weight, compared to those whose physicians used a more judgmental or confrontational style of communication,” the e-zine further notes.
“Patients whose physicians communicated well lost about 3.5 pounds three months after the visit,” Diet-Blog goes on to say.