Clinical nutrition

For health professionals

For lay public

Professional organisations

Fat acceptance

For health professionals

Pick of the crop National Heart Lung Blood Inst, Obesity Guidelines Full report, summary, BMI calculator, evidence data etc on this major public health document and project from NHLBI. Family practice: weighing your patient Guide for the family physician. Family practice: managing your patient Follow on article from the above, to guide family physicians in weight management once a diagnosis has been reached. Obesity Position Paper: American Association of Clinical Endocrinologists This is a first class resource. The result of an expert review this lengthy, detailed, referenced and well illustrated position paper expresses the cutting edge of medical opinion on the causes, diagnosis and management of obesity as of 1997. There are useful appendices, such as a patient evaluation checklist, a sample consent form for treatment, points for patient counselling, including patient information on the complications of VLCDs. There is also an amendments section, which deals with the phenfluramine issue.

Roche-Obesity.Net

Excellent site on weight issues from Hoffman-Roche, with health professional information, web links, BMI and health risk calculator, interactive quiz on calorie awareness, patient and drug information etc.

Adiposity 101

It is not really clear from this web page who is responsible for it, but this is a very long review on the background science and clinical aspects of management for weight control. Generally it is pitched at reasonably technical level more suited to health professionals, but it could be read by a lay person. The author's viewpoint seems to be that it is time for a new paradigm in obesity management.

American Association of Clinical Endocrinologists: position statement on obesity

From AACE and American College of Endocrinology this is their detailed, joint statement on the Prevention, Diagnosis and Treatment of Obesity, in its 1998 revision. The panel that put it together is highly distinguished, so the document is not to be taken lightly. (There is another version of this document, which appears strangely at the end of a position statement on growth hormone). There is also a patient evaluation guide associated with the position statement.

American Dietetic Association position paper on Weight Management

Adopted October 1996. Detailed with references.

British Dietitians Assocation: Position Paper on Obesity Treatment

Well referenced position paper from dietitians in the UK.

Donald B. Brown Research Chair on Obesity

Web site dedicated to this university chair within the University of Laval, the site is in English and French and features conference information, a gene map, and a good list of list of Internet links.

Obesity notes: Dynamed

You need to register at the site first, as it is a commercial venture..

Weight control and obesity a peer-reviewed bibliography

From FNIC, one of a series of bibliographies "reviewed by experts and professionals in the field". No abstracts, just citation details. Issued in three editions, one for consumers, one for health professionals, and one for educators.

Obesity: CME for physicians

Unit in a series of topics on a web site for physicians to complete CME requirements. The idea is to read the on-line articles, sit for an on-line quiz and receive your credited CME points. Unfortunately the articles in this unit, whilst detailed and well referenced, are plain text and not case based, but overall the material is instructive.

National Heart Lung and Blood Institute: Obesity Information Health Care Professionals

Includes: Strategy Development Workshop for Public Education on Weight and Obesity. Also lay material and information on their 1991 launched Obesity Education Initiative.

Nutrition and Weight Management Online Course by LearnWell

Interesting idea. Targetted at nurses and others, this is an on-line tutorial more than anything, which is offered for free on-line (or as part of a credit course from Griggs University or Cosumnes River College.) It utilises mainly links to other web sites for access to nutrition information, based around a question format. It is intended to take about 3 hours to work through. The set of links provided makes for an interesting albeit necesswarily very selective tour of nutrition on the Internet.

US national overweight statistics

From the National Center for Health Statistics, tables showing US national values in relation to prevalence of overweight, broken down by sex, age, race, and Hispanic origin. Shows comparative figures over four 4-5 year periods from 1960 to 1991.

British Dietary Association Position Paper on obesity and malnutition in hospital

Detailed and referenced position papers.

Obesity In Children

Article in the Internet Journal of Health Promotion reporting on a research project from Australia which aimed to demonstrate that simple intervention techniques can be an effective approach towards reducing the prevalence of obesity in children.

Weight control for heart disease (American Heart Foundation)

Lay leaflet material.

International Journal of Obesity

Table of contents for current issue and no content. On the other hand you can put yourself on an email mailing list for receiving future TOCs.

NIH conference Consensus Statements on Obesity

Statement on obesity from National Institutes of Health Consensus Development Conference. This one is from 1991 on "Gastrointestinal Surgery for Severe Obesity", and there is also one on Health Implications of Obesity from 1984.

Weighing the Options: Criteria for Evaluating Weight-Management Programs

National Academy of Sciences report on how to assess weight management program outcomes.

NIH consensus statement on surgical treatment for obesity

National Institutes of Health Consensus Development Conference Statement March 1991. Absolutely plain text document!.

Rationale for Obesity Surgery

Detailed referenced review paper from the American Society for Bariatric Surgery.

Voluntary Weight Loss: NIH conference paper

Plain text scholarly literature review published by the National Institutes of Health, Office of Medical Applications of Research, Technology Assessment as a Conference Statement from 1992.

Weighing the Case against Fen-Phen

This is a well considered article from the premier scientist-to-scientist communication web site Biomednet (you will need to register the first time you access this site - it is free). As with all their articles, this is written by an expert in the field, at a good general scientific level (but not specifically just for physicians.) On top of that you get good references to research articles, and other web sites. Well worthwhile reading. See also their article on body weight and mortality.

Trends in the Well-Being of America's Children and Youth

DHSS report (in PDF format) with whole range of statistical data about children and teenagers, including tables on prevalence of overweight disorders.

Donald B. Brown Research Chair on Obesity

Links and information on obesity from a new obesity chair in Canada.

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For lay public

Pick of the crop Yahoo! Full Coverage:Obesity Issues Stay abreast of developments with news material and links from Yahoo

American Acad.Family Phsycians material on weight loss

This resource has various materials on weight control for patients.

Barbara's obesity news

Offers lay oriented, fee subscription newsletter on the latest scientific research and political developments related to treatments for obesity. The FenPhen issue features prominently. There is limited free access to selected articles and the current issue. As well, a reasonable amount of background material (e.g. on leptin), Q&A and links to other obesity sites.

Don's Diet & Weight Loss / Fitness Page

Weight management links: seems to take a fairly balanced approach in his selection. Well worth a look, particularly to get a picture of the lay perspective on this extremely popular Internet subject.

Diet Central

A commercial site intended to have lots of material for the lay public interested in weight control and healthy lifestyle. This is to include daily health news, information from a dietitian on some of the `populist" diet books around, diet diary to help the visitor keep track of their dieting progress, food news, Q&A with experts and much more. However, the site has been in development for some time and as of when we last checked (11/98) the substantive content was still under development more than a reality.

The Diet Channel

Links to hundreds of sites related to weight loss.

DietWatch Diary

Novel approach to weight control and exercise, which uses a plug-in added to your web browser to chart dietary intake and exercise as well as weight/BMI. Aims to make users part of a virtual community, with nutrition news, web links and chat rooms.

FAQ about Health and Fat People

Long plain text FAQ from and containing information about various mailing list support groups for overweight people. As you might expect the tenor of the material is supportive rather than gloomy, although realistic about adverse consequences as well. Good lay resource.

Healthy Weight Network

"Healthy Weight Network provides a critical link between research and practical application in weight and eating issues". Their web site has information about books for sale, and their journal Healthy Weight Journal, editorials and some parts of which are on-line here. The general idea seems to be scientific appraisal of diet information, some fat acceptance and providing lay resources.

Multi-Diet Weight Loss Techniques

A site devoted to a particular weight loss diet approach (the threshold theory) and promoting a specific book about it.

National Heart Lung and Blood Institute: Obesity Information for lay public

There is also a health professional section

NIH: Patient Information on Obesity

The NIH (through its National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases) has quite a few lay documents, some with graphics. They are indexed on this page under the heading of Weight Control Information Network.

Obesity and weight control: Dr.Michael Myers

A physician in the US has put together a lay oriented site which is quite detailed, and contains plain text explanations of many aspects of obesity diagnosis and management, from an orthodox perspective. There are also short news briefs on current controversies. Useful site for the intelligent lay browser.

Obesity site: Nancy J. Schmidt

Information put together by a health educator in the US on obesity. The sections are short and to some degree their most useful function is to draw together other sites that are linked to each section, so as to provide a kind of overview of the subject from a web perspective.

Overeaters Anonymous

American-based support group for compulsive overeaters. Information about the group and its meetings.

Sapient Health Network: weight control

Membership based web site for patients with chronic conditions. The weight control section has news on scientific findings, articles by a physician specialising in this area, a BMI calculator, chat rooms, message boards and an event calendar. To access these resources, you have to join which althoug free involves filling in a very personal questionnaire which is based on you being an overweight person.

Shape Up America!

Very useful site. "A public health initiative of the Koop Foundation, a non-profit corporation. Headed by C. Everett Koop, M.D., the former Surgeon General of the United States. Launched in December 1994 to combat the rising rates of obesity in America." This site is a very well constructed and illustrated one focussing on healthy diet and exercise. It has a healteh professional `library' with a lengthy Guidance Document on the Treatment of Adult Obesity, lots of lay educational material on-line, sections which allow the visitor to calculate their own BMI, to assess their fitness level,and to find out about different types of physical activity. There are also press releases.

Weigh Down Workshop

"A Christian-based weight loss program", this site featues a newsletter.

Weight Watchers

Contact information for local chapters, news and on-line forum, nutrition facts and eating plans, nutrition facts, interactive quiz.

The Zone diet: Zoneperfect

Commercial site which offers items for sale, as well as resources such as body fat calculator, links to other sites.

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Obesity organisations

American Obesity Association

Newsletter, organisational information for this group which has both health professional, advocate and lay interests, as well as a Research Foundation.

American Society for Bariatric Surgery.

List of members, organisational details and a review paper on the rationale for obesity surgery.

The Calorie Control Council

Industry body which "represents 60 manufacturers and suppliers of low-calorie, low-fat and light foods and beverages". The web site features information on low calorie sweeteners and fat replacers, exercise and food labelling, statistical data, FAQs, recipes, a calorie calculator, a "Press Room" and a section for health professionals and educators, as well as a search engine.

International Association for Study of Obesity

Information about the Society and it's journal International Journal of Obesity. Also on-line access to its current newsletter. There is a separate web site for the International Obesity TaskForce.

North American Association for the Study of Obesity

Information on the organisation, its journal "Obesity Research" and events, plus a discussion group for members only.

Weight-control Information Network

National information service of the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases.

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Fat acceptance

Beyond Dieting

Web site from Rhonda Zabrodski,, a registered clinical social worker from Canada, with links and resources on the line that "the vast majority of people, diets simply do not work over the long term", so it is important to make "peace with food and the bathroom scale"

Fat Acceptance

"The fat acceptance movement seeks to dispel myths and promote facts about fatness, and fights unfair discrimination on the basis of size or weight." This site has FAQ, contacts and information on fat acceptance support groups (including particularly those in San Francisco area), oversize clothing sources, resources on the Internet etc., and a list of US health professionals who are stated to be `fat accepting'.

`Fat friendly' health professionals

From `Fat Acceptance' site, a list of health professionals who are said to have a positive or fat accepting attitude to overweight patients. Part of a lay Fat Acceptance site.

International No Diet Day

Resources, contact information, history of this anti-dieting, large-people's rights movement, focussed on its `day' on May 6th.

International Size Acceptance Association

Organisational details, penpals, local chapters, links and resources, discussion board.

Largesse, the Network for Size Esteem

"International clearinghouse for information on size diversity empowerment". Contains resource material and information on International No Diet Day.

National Association to Advance Fat Acceptance

Organisational information, links, brochures, policy statements, local chapters etc.

Promoting Healthy Body Image

On-line document deriving from a 1993 workshop "designed to explore body image problems among women, identify connections between maternal weight struggles and infant low birth weight and offer health promotion models and strategies for change".

Voluntary Weight Loss: NIH conference paper

Plain text scholarly literature review published by the National Institutes of Health, Office of Medical Applications of Research, Technology Assessment as a Conference Statement from 1992.

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EATING DISORDERS