ESPE Abstracts

Background: Non-compliance is a major issue for treatment failure in childhood obesity.

Objective and hypotheses: To identify the barriers of adherence to weight management programs, of obese children and adolescents.

Method: A descriptive, ongoing study based on phone recorded questionnaires with the use of information from the medical records. The study group consisted of 85 overweight and obese children and adolescents (M/F=46/39) with mean present age 15.5 years (S.D.=2.6), that failed to complete their weight management programs in a hospital based pediatric outpatient clinic. Analyses were conducted using SPSS statistical software (version 19.0).

Results: 56% of the interviewees declared that they first visited the outpatient clinic on parents’ initiative and 40% of them after a pediatricians’ referral. 20% attended in order to investigate whether there was any medical pathology, 40% only for nutritional support and consultation and 40% for both. Mean percentage of fat at 1st visit was 38.3. Most common reasons for treatment abandonment were children’s denial to return to the clinic (32.9%), difficulties in scheduling consultations due to parents and patients activities (29.4%) and long time of transportation (20.0%). In almost half of the cases (50.6%) there was a weight reduction in comparison to the one they had during treatment. However in 71.8% of the cases parents reported that their child was still overweight. In 15/85 children there were related disorders with most common being psychological ones and difficulties in getting dressed (ten/15 children).

Conclusion: Time limitations both for the children and parents and practical difficulties are the main reasons for not completing the weight management program. Pediatric endocrine departments can collaborate with primary care providers and offer obesity clinics or group therapy at a local level in order to assure increased compliance with minimal inconvenience for the family.