Testing the short-term effectiveness of primary care referral to online weight loss programmes: A randomised controlled trial.

Guidelines ask health professionals to offer brief advice to encourage weight loss for people living with obesity. We tested whether referral to one of three online programmes could lead to successful weight loss. A total of 528 participants aged ≥18 years with a body mass index of ≥30 kg/m were invited via a letter from their GP.

Extended follow-up of a short total diet replacement programme: results of the Doctor Referral of Overweight People to Low Energy total diet replacement Treatment (DROPLET) randomised controlled trial at 3 years.

Objectives: To test the long-term effectiveness of a total diet replacement programme (TDR) for routine treatment of obesity in a primary care setting.

Methods: This study was a pragmatic, two-arm, parallel-group, open-label, individually randomised controlled trial in adults with obesity. The outcomes were change in weight and biomarkers of diabetes and cardiovascular disease risk from baseline to 3 years, analysed as intention-to-treat with mixed effects models.