Attitudes towards obesity in health care

Abstract

This paper reviews the literature that has investigated individuals’ attitudes towards obesity, either quantitatively or qualitatively. This review primarily focuses on research involving trainee and registered health care professionals (HCPs). The inclusion criteria were (a) data‐ based research studies or (b) qualitative research of physicians, nurses and other HCPs; (c) evaluating obesity attitudes and beliefs of HCPs and (d) trainee HCPs; (e) studies published in English after year 2000. The results revealed that negative attitudes towards obese persons are prevalent, irrespective of health profession. Yet variables of sex, ethnicity, age, body mass index (BMI) and work experience yielded conflicting results among the selected studies. Implications include the need for additional research, awareness education and practice guidelines.