COPING SKILLS CALLED KEY TO WEIGHT LOSS : STUDY FINDS EMOTIONS AS VITAL AS GOOD EATING HABITS, EXERCISE.Byline: Michael Dougan San Francisco Examiner The San Francisco Examiner is a U.S. daily newspaper. It has been published continuously in San Francisco, California, since the late 19th Century. History 19th century The beginning of the Examiner is a topic of some controversy. Being overweight isn't simply a matter of eating too much - nor is the solution merely to cut calories and increase exercise, according to according to prep. 1. As stated or indicated by; on the authority of: according to historians. 2. In keeping with: according to instructions. 3. a study at University of California The University of California has a combined student body of more than 191,000 students, over 1,340,000 living alumni, and a combined systemwide and campus endowment of just over $7.3 billion (8th largest in the United States). at San Francisco. Associate clinical Professor Laurel Mellin said a two-year study of 22 subjects revealed that successful long-term weight loss resulted from a program that included improved emotional coping skills, along with better eating and exercise habits. Mellin, reached last week in San Antonio, where she was presenting her results at a conference of dietitians, said the program developed at UCSF UCSF University of California at San Francisco is more effective than popular weight-loss schemes, including crash diets and drugs that suppress the appetite. ``In the long term, the current approaches have been remarkably ineffective,'' said Mellin, who warned that drug therapies introduced in the past few months may pose risks that haven't been identified at this early stage. Mellin, who joined the UCSF staff 18 years ago to study childhood obesity childhood obesity Public health Overweight in a child, an average BMI of ≥ 85% for age and sex; ≥ 95% for age and sex is very obese. See Body-mass index, Obesity. Cf Adult obesity. , said her current research stemmed from discoveries made while working with kids. ``I discovered that childhood obesity could actually be resolved when parents taught their children these (coping) skills,'' she said. ``If parents nurtured their children better, their children's hands would naturally come out of the cookie jar.'' Likewise, Mellin said, most subjects in her first adult study lost weight when their coping skills improved and also reported benefits that included better money management, job performance and sense of spirituality. Mellin acknowledged that 22 people did not make a large study group. ``You really need more subjects,'' she said. But the researcher claimed nutrition and diet professionals are taking note because ``the results are so unheard of. . . . They're getting healthier and healthier and that's not ever what we've seen in the literature.'' That included a weight loss for 91 percent of participants and a drop in their level of depression. Two years later, she said, a vast majority reported that they still experienced improved moods and relationships, better work performance and ``deepened spirituality.'' The subjects participated in weekly meetings, led by a dietitian dietitian /di·e·ti·tian/ (di?e-tish´in) one skilled in the use of diet in health and disease. di·e·ti·tian or di·e·ti·cian n. A person specializing in dietetics. and mental health counselor A mental health counselor is a professional who provides counseling to individuals, couples, families, groups, or larger systems. A mental health counselor may also have training in educational and vocational counseling (MacCluskie & Ingersoll 2001). , over four months. |
|
||||||||||||
Printer friendly
Cite/link
Email
Feedback
Reader Opinion