3 1 Current overweight and obesity trends amongst individuals in the United

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Current overweight and obesity trends amongst individuals in the United States of America have shown that without the implementation of appropriate intervention measures, about 90% of adults are likely to be obese or overweight as of 2030. This will have devastating consequences on an economic front for the country and the healthcare system. The costs related to healthcare are increasing by the day, the costs as of 2011 have reached an estimated $860.7 and $956.9 billion, and the figures almost account for one-fifth of all healthcare costs. The same compares with values for costs attributed to healthcare in obesity and overweight around 1998. An analysis of the problem showed that the condition is likely to outrun both drinking and smoking due to its deleterious effects on health costs and health in general. As a result, there is a need to propose suitable intervention measures for the issue of obesity among lesbian populations, but first, there is a need to review current or initial treatment measures.

Previous Obesity Treatment Measures

Initial guidelines for treating obese and overweight patients have called for interventions of lifestyle measures and a focus on appropriate exercise and diet. Also, the guidelines have equally included medications, but on a short-term basis. Some medications have included phentermine, phendimetrazine, diethylpropion, benzphetamine, and sympathomimetic drugs. Despite their lacking evidence as to what type of exercise or diet regimen applies best. Similarly, the medication has equally been linked to underlying side effects, which has necessitated the need to develop apt intervention measures that are wholly inclusive. This is through the addition of behavioral interventions such as nutrition education, cognitive restructuring, social support, food diaries, and a mixture of exercise and dieting. In this case, the proposed intervention measure will also consolidate the special and unique features of the population under review and their health problems. The intervention measures will include measures that seek other support services apart from health-care-oriented services.

The Proposed 5A’s Intervention Framework

The specific obesity prevention intervention based on health can be examined utilizing the 5A framework. The framework is important in identifying some risk factors for chronic ailments such as obesity. It has also been instrumental when considering or planning interventions for physiological and behavioral elements related to obesity that are necessary to address. These 5As refer to: Ask, Assess, Advise, Assist, and Arrange. The first element of asking necessitates an inquiry about the risk factors. The second element of assessment infers assessing readiness to change, health literacy, and risk factors level (Murray et al., 2018). The third element of agreeing/advising infers the application of motivational interviewing in the view of agreeing with goals. The fourth assistance element is developing plans to address goals that need to be met. The fifth element of arranging infers organizing support for achieving goals and change sustenance. Below is a propounded review of these elements to support alleviating obesity among lesbian populations.

Ask and Assess

The elements of asking and assess have been examined, citing that both emphasize assembling initial information, which is insightful in determining the next course of action. A focus in this stage has been on supporting evidence that weighing individuals and discussing risks linked to adding excess weight may impact readiness towards change and individual knowledge, which are elementary factors in preventing obesity (Pearce et al., 2019). The same has been seconded by the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute and the US Preventive Taskforce, which have recommended health services to screen high-risk individuals for obesity.

Screening includes the identification of risk factors and establishes if an individual is seeking to make adjustments in addressing the risk factors and their ability to do the same based on factors including health literacy. Health literacy, in this perspective, means the ability of an individual to apply, interpret, apply, and understand information to their healthcare and health. In the studies, there was a significant focus on risk factors determination and health literacy establishment among various individuals (Pearce et al., 2021). The intervention measure further proposes the need to assess risk factors linked to obesity and the likely impacts on health. This means there is an underlying necessity to train staff on matters such as readiness for change and health literacy.

Advise

Intervention measures also require the need to provide prevention advice. As a result, the healthcare system must offer specific training in supporting the role. However, targeted training does not mean there are automatic changes in practice. Initial studies have shown that training can change practice relevant to risk factors assessment but never changed the practice relative to lending advice. Initial studies have shown that clinicians did not lend reports on whether individuals who received advice changed behavior or retained the advice in the long run (Murray et al., 2018). However, systematic studies have shown that advice can be used to tell individuals about the need to lose weight and ways of doing the same, as well as sustainable weight loss. This is in the view of reducing the significant impacts that obesity has on health. It has equally considered supporting patients and people in general in setting goals around risk factors linked to obesity or their weight.

Assist

The next of the 5A’s intervention mechanisms consists of interventions to assist patients in managing their lifestyle changes. Primary studies addressed this component or element instead of enclosing health services’ role not in lending support but rather in the inclusion of other agencies in providing support. Due to this reason, previous literature on this element has noted that long-term support was necessary for assisting individuals in embedding the changes but did not provide exact details of the results (Petrovksis et al., 2021). Another conclusion has noted that there is a need to assist people in setting the goals associated with managing weight while achieving better results compared to connecting goals to general health enhancements. However, this element needs to be expanded to improve the whole intervention measure.

Arrange

The final step within this intervention framework is a recommendation on lending support to help individuals maintain and achieve their weight loss goals. This step is paramount in providing appropriate intervention measures for dealing with obesity. However, this element also relies on other support services. For instance, recent studies across community health centers showed a need to vest support on community health staff in incorporating assessment, referral, and brief advice related to addressing risk factors of chronic ailments plus risk factors related to obesity (Pearce et al., 2019). The intervention has been well supported by over one year of implementation, including electronic resources, staff training, and pre-intervention policy changes. The intervention can be deemed successful in that staff undertook more assessments related to risk factors. However, they did not have any link to referral or intervention advice (Pearce et al., 2021). Alike outcomes were also gained within a set of mental health treatment. This forms the conclusion that even with strategies from a clinical perspective offered, incorporating preventive care when it comes to caring rates and interactions on matters such as physical activity or vegetable and fruit intake remain low. Studies thus suggested that while addressing this element, it is instrumental in keeping it away from the health care setting and confined within the home and addressed with the support of family members and friends. American Nurses Association condemns discrimination based on sexual orientation, gender identity, and/or expression in health care and recognizes that it continues to be an issue despite the increasing recognition and acceptance of LGBTQ+ populations (ANA, 2018).

Conclusion

Obesity has often been referred to as a ‘wicked problem.’ Some of the reasons that have been likened to this description are the multifactorial reasons that require complex solutions. While an approach from population health is imperative in addressing the complexities, the remittance of health services must be extended beyond treatment on a medical capacity to incorporate prevention of obesity within clinical. To date, research has taken up a linear approach towards implementing guidelines without an explicit factor of the impact the same has had on perceptions of managers and clinicians to the addressing or role discourses of individual duty.

 Additional study into health services’ role in preventing overweight and obesity should utilize a systems tactic in examining the effects of various models of care while also considering the health staff’s perception of preventing obesity and obesity in general. This has foreseen the impact of various issues on the individual abilities to make lifestyle changes. As noted above and consistent with obese lesbian populations, this paper has explored intervention measures to resolve the health problem. The intervention measure reviewed herein is the 5A’s mechanism consisting of Ask, Assess, Advice, Assist, and Arrange.

References

Murray, M., Pearson, J. L., Dordevic, A. L., & Bonham, M. P. (2018). The impact of multicomponent weight management interventions on quality of life in adolescents affected by overweight or obesity: A meta-analysis of randomized controlled trials. Obesity Reviews, 20(2), 278-289. https://doi.org/10.1111/obr.12774

Pearce, C., Rychetnik, L., Wutzke, S., & Wilson, A. (2019). Obesity prevention and the role of hospital and community-based health services: A scoping review. BMC Health Services Research, 19(1). https://doi.org/10.1186/s12913-019-4262-3

Pearce, C., Rychetnik, L., & Wilson, A. (2021). The obesity paradigm and the role of health services in obesity prevention: A grounded theory approach. BMC Health Services Research, 21(1). https://doi.org/10.1186/s12913-021-06089-w

Petrovskis, A., Baquero, B., & Bekemeier, B. (2021). Involvement of local health departments in obesity prevention: A scoping review. Journal of Public Health Management and Practice, 28(2), E345-E353. https://doi.org/10.1097/phh.0000000000001346