How is class III obesity treated?
How is class III obesity treated?
Treatment for class III obesity is very individualized. Every person is unique and thus requires a treatment plan that’s specific to their situation and goals. Together, you and your healthcare provider can come up with a plan that treats underlying secondary causes of obesity and manages health conditions related to obesity, if you have any.
Treating class III obesity involves a multi-prong strategy. Management for class III obesity may include:
- Healthy lifestyle changes.
- Behavioral and psychological therapy.
- Medications.
- Surgical procedures.
Healthy lifestyle changes
Certain lifestyle changes can help you manage obesity, improve your overall health and/or lose weight, including:
- Heart-healthy eating: Your healthcare provider may recommend meeting with a registered dietician or nutritionist to learn about which foods and amounts of food are part of a healthy eating pattern. If you need to lose weight, it’s important to try to reduce your total daily calories gradually. Talk with your provider before making any drastic changes to your diet.
- Physical activity: Physical activity has many health benefits, and it’s an important factor in determining whether a person can maintain a healthy body weight, lose excess body weight or maintain healthy weight loss. Before starting any exercise program, ask your healthcare provider about what amount and type of physical activity is right for you.
- Healthy sleep: If you’re not getting enough sleep or have a sleep disorder, it’s essential to return to healthy sleep and/or receive treatment for sleep disorders in order to manage obesity. Lack of sleep is linked to weight gain.
- Stress management: Chronic stress can contribute to weight gain, so it’s important to learn to cope with stress in a healthy way, such as with meditation or breathing exercises, and minimize it as much as possible.
Behavioral and psychological therapy
Your healthcare provider may recommend enrolling in individual or group behavioral weight-loss programs to help treat obesity. In these programs, a specially trained healthcare provider will customize a weight-loss plan for you.
Mood disorders, such as depression and anxiety, occur at high rates among people with obesity. Because of this, your provider may also recommend psychological therapy if you have a mental health condition.
Different types of behavioral and psychological therapies that can help treat obesity include:
- Motivational interviewing: Motivational interviewing is a type of therapy that helps with behavior change. It’s designed to empower you to change by determining your own meaning, importance and capacity for change.
- Cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT): In this therapy, a therapist or psychologist works with you to change your thinking and behavioral patterns that are harmful or unhelpful. CBT usually takes place over multiple sessions. Through talking and asking questions, your therapist or psychologist helps you gain a different perspective. As a result, you learn to respond better to and cope with stress, anxiety and difficult situations.
- Dialectical behavioral therapy (DBT): This therapy is a modification of CBT. It can help if you have difficulty with emotional regulation or are exhibiting self-destructive behaviors, such as disordered eating patterns.
- Interpersonal psychotherapy (IPT): The main goal of IPT is to improve the quality of your interpersonal relationships (relationships you have with other people) and social functioning to help reduce stress.