Effects of an Intensive Lifestyle Intervention to Treat Overweight/Obese Children and Adolescents.

Objective: The purpose of the present study is to examine the effects of a multidisciplinary lifestyle intervention to treat overweight/obese children and adolescents. The main outcome was cardiometabolic risk based on the waist-to-height ratio (WHTR) measurement. Secondary outcomes were (1) changes in body composition; (2) adherence to a Mediterranean diet; and (3) physical performance.

Fertilizing a Patient Engagement Ecosystem to Innovate Healthcare: .

Currently we observe a gap between theory and practices of patient engagement. If both scholars and health practitioners do agree on the urgency to realize patient engagement, no shared guidelines exist so far to orient clinical practice. Despite a supportive policy context, progress to achieve greater patient engagement is patchy and slow and often concentrated at the level of policy regulation without dialoguing with practitioners from the clinical field as well as patients and families.

Living with an adult who has diabetes: Qualitative insights from the second Diabetes Attitudes, Wishes and Needs (DAWN2) study.

Aims: The second Diabetes Attitudes, Wishes and Needs (DAWN2) study identified the experiences of family members who support adults living with diabetes.

Methods: Participants were 2057 adult family members living with the person with diabetes from 17 countries. Qualitative data were responses to open-ended survey questions about how living with a person with diabetes has impacted family members and the ways they choose to be involved in the diabetes care for the person with whom they live.

The impact of strenuous group physical activity on mood states, personal views, body composition, and markers of myocardial damage in overweight/obese adults: the "Step-by-step Italy's coast to coast" trek.

It is clinically relevant to understand whether it is safe to recommend to trained overweight/obese people long-distance treks and whether these experiences could have a negative psychological impact or become even dangerous exposing the trekkers to the risk of clinically silent myocardial damage. To answer these questions we have performed a quantitative/qualitative study comparing the changes in mood profiles, personal views, body composition, and plasma troponin levels of 40 overweight/obese subjects with those of 36 healthy normal weight subjects after the participation in a trek of 388 km from the Adriatic to the Tyrrhenian seas trek: the "Step by step…Italy's coast to coast". The results of this study demonstrate that long-distance treks are a safe activity for trained overweight/obese people which should be recommended because they improve mood, health status, and the relationship of participants with themselves and with the regular practice of exercise with effects similar to those obtained by healthy normal weight subjects.

Personal accounts of the negative and adaptive psychosocial experiences of people with diabetes in the second Diabetes Attitudes, Wishes and Needs (DAWN2) study.

Objective: To identify the psychosocial experiences of diabetes, including negative accounts of diabetes and adaptive ways of coping from the perspective of the person with diabetes.

Research Design And Methods: Participants were 8,596 adults (1,368 with type 1 diabetes and 7,228 with type 2 diabetes) in the second Diabetes Attitudes, Wishes and Needs (DAWN2) study. Qualitative data were responses to open-ended survey questions about successes, challenges, and wishes for improvement in living with diabetes and about impactful experiences.

A time-lagged, actor-partner interdependence analysis of alliance to the group as a whole and group member outcome in overweight and obesity treatment groups.

A time-lagged design was used to examine how the perceptions of alliance to the group as a whole by the other group members at an earlier point in the group were related to an individual group member's perceptions of alliance to the group as a whole at a later point in the group. We also examined how treatment outcome moderated this relationship. Seventy-three patients diagnosed as overweight or obese participating in 10 short-term therapy groups provided data for analyses.

Mutual interactions between depression/quality of life and adherence to a multidisciplinary lifestyle intervention in obesity.

Context: There is scarce knowledge of the interaction between depression/health-related quality of life (HRQOL) and lifestyle intervention in obesity.

Objective: The aim of the study was to establish whether baseline mood status or HRQOL affects attendance to educational or exercise sessions and whether attendance to these two components of the intervention affects mood and/or HRQOL in obesity.

Design: A total of 282 overweight/obese subjects (body mass index, 33.

Multidisciplinary lifestyle intervention in the obese: its impact on patients' perception of the disease, food and physical exercise.

Background And Aims: To be successful, lifestyle intervention in obesity must take into account patients' views. The aim of the present study, conducted using a narrative-autobiographical approach, was to report on the perception of disease, food and physical exercise in a group of 80 obese patients during a structured multidisciplinary lifestyle intervention.

Methods And Results: Patients underwent lifestyle intervention, of three months' duration, structured in the following steps: 1) an initial medical examination; 2) an interview by a psychologist; 3) an assessment by a dietician, 4) a physical examination by a specialist in sports medicine; 5) an individualized program consisting of 24 sessions (two per week) of structured indoor exercise 6) eight sessions of group therapeutic education; 7) Nordic walking activity combined with walking excursions during weekends.

An innovative model for changing the lifestyles of persons with obesity and/or Type 2 diabetes mellitus.

Aim: To describe the multidisciplinary lifestyle intervention model used in an experimental CURIAMO (Centro Universitario Ricerca Interdipartimentale Attività Motoria) project designed to validate the short- and long-term efficacy of the model in obesity and Type 2 diabetes.

Research Design And Methods: Over a 3-yr period, about 1000 adults (70% diabetes-free and overweight or obese; 30% with Type 2 diabetes and overweight or obese).

Inclusion Criteria: Age range 18-80 yr, body mass index >27 kg/m2 with or without Type 2 diabetes mellitus; participants will be divided into three age groups (18-45, 45-65, 65-80 yr).

Optimizing patient education for people with obesity: possible use of the autobiographical approach.

Objective: To review recent results of the current approaches to the education of obese people, focusing on the motivation for healthy behaviors, and to present the narrative-autobiographical approach as a possible tool in the education of obese people.

Methods: Our overview will necessarily be partial, and limited to some studies that succeeded in improving the motivation for healthy lifestyles in people with overweight or obesity. We will also describe the use of the autobiographical approach in the "Io-muovo-la-mia-vita" project.

The narrative-autobiographical approach in the group education of adolescents with diabetes: a qualitative research on its effects.

Objective: To introduce a narrative-autobiographical approach in the care and education of adolescents with type-1 diabetes and observe the effects of this novel approach on adolescents' self-awareness, concern for self-care, and well-being.

Methods: Ninety-four adolescents with type-1 diabetes attending one 9-day summer camp in 2004, 2005, or 2006 participated in structured daily self-writing proposals on diabetes, integrated with daily interactive self-management education. After some months, we sent participants interview-like questionnaires, and two independent researchers performed a qualitative analysis of the 50 answers that were mailed back.