Promoting Weight Loss and Psychological Well-being in Obese Patients

Cognitive Behavioral life-style modification: The intervention will be composed of 12 weekly sessions. Each session will last about two hours and will be administered in a group setting (maximum 20 participants). During the first two sessions, a clinician will introduce the program to the participants and motivate them to make life-style changes.In the next eight sessions a dietician will provide participants with basics of nutrition and will coach them to use a structured diary to monitor their eating behavior and physical activity. Next, a physician will introduce to the patients various weight loss surgeries in terms of the adverse events, indications and effects of each option.The last session will be held by a psychologist and will focus on providing participants with useful strategies to promote healthy eating habits and physical activity, including problem solving and goal setting.

This program will consist of 4 weekly group-based sessions and each meeting will last about two hours. During the sessions, participants will be coached how to self-monitor their well-being episodes in everyday life, especially those associated with life-style change, by means of a structured diary. Patients will be then ecounraged to discuss their well-being experiences during group sessions, focusing on dysfunctional thoughts/beliefs interrupting them, fostering the identification of more functional thoughts. The psychologist will also teach them how to promote well-being situations through behavioral exercises and will introduce to the participants relevant psychological well-being dimensions (based on Carol Ryff's multidimensional model) associated with patients' experiences emerged during the treatment.

The treatment as usual will involve any recommendation given to the participants by their physicians, including diet, physical activity and medication.