If you are overweight, the one person you might expect to treat you fairly and in an unbiased manner is your dietician. But researchers at Yale University say that even amongst dieticians there is a pronounced weight bias. The research, which was published in the latest issue of the Journal of the American Dietetic Association, supports findings in the January edition of Obesity that suggested those who were overweight were stigmatised in all areas of their life, including the workplace, school, in health care and at home.
The researchers examined the attitudes of 182 dietitic students towards obese patients and the results are fairly shocking. 40% of students said they believed the overweight were lacking in willpower and were self-indulgent and lazy, while the majority agreed that obese individuals had poor self control and self-esteem. Only 2% expressed positive or neutral attitudes towards the overweight.
This particular research is especially alarming as clearly dieticians have extended and frequent contact with patients struggling with their weight, not to mention being required to do extensive counselling with them to help them reduce their BMI. A strong bias and tendancy to pre-judge could severely impact on patient care.
The authors of the study, Rebecca Puhl and Chelsea Heuer , of the centre for Food Policy and Obesity at Yale, and Christopher Wharton, of Arizona State University, have pointed to the similarities between these findings and other attitudes reported by a variety of health care providers. They write, “Our findings are worrisome because the quality of patient care can be compromised by negative provider attitudes and bias. There is a clear need to address this issue in training of health care professionals”.