View article

Objectives:

To investigate the causes of attrition reported by obese patients treated by medical centres.

Design:

Observational study.

Setting:

Obese patients enrolled in a long-term study involving 18 Italian medical centres.

Participants:

A total of 940 obese patients (727 female; mean age, 49 years; mean BMI, 38.6 kg/m 2).

Measurements:

Causes of attrition reported by dropouts during a structured telephone interview.

Results:

After a median observation period of 41 months (range, 25–50), 766 of 940 patients (81.5%) discontinued treatment. Sixty-two per cent of total dropout occurred in the first year of follow-up. Seventy-four per cent of dropouts reported a single primary reasons for treatment interruption. Two primary reasons were reported by 22.4% of patients, and three reasons by 3.4%. Practical difficulties, alone or in combination, were reported by more than half of dropouts (55%), and were the leading cause of …