Patients with obesity seeking kidney transplants need support to achieve weight loss
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Patients with obesity trying to achieve the required weight loss to be added to the kidney transplant list need support, according to data published in Kidney Medicine.
Further, patients in this study expressed a desire to lose weight but faced several challenges.
“Obesity has become both a driver for the increased incidence of kidney failure and a barrier to treatment of patients with kidney failure,” Johanne Freeman, MD, from the University of Copenhagen, and colleagues wrote. “This study aims to explore the thoughts, feelings, and attitudes of patients with obesity who must lose weight to receive a new kidney. The hope is that we as health professionals can adapt and find better ways to help patients with obesity achieve adequate and sustainable weight loss.”
In a qualitative study with semi-structured interviews and an exploratory research design, researchers interviewed 10 patients (seven were men; age ranged from 42 to 66 years) about their experience of being overweight. Seven patients were receiving dialysis at the time of the interviews, and nine of the 10 were attempting to lose weight to be approved for the kidney transplant list. One patient had already lost the weight and was on the list.
Interviews ranged from 7 to 20 minutes and included questions about the impact being overweight has had on patients’ lives and the level of support they have had in their weight-loss attempts. Researched taped the interviews and later examined the transcriptions using inductive conventional content analysis to identify similar themes.
Analyses revealed the following four themes:
- restrictions and exhaustion;
- hope and hopelessness;
- support and self-discipline; and
- motivation based on severity.
Among the patients, a common motivating factor to achieve weight loss was their declining kidney function, and the requirement of weight loss to gain a kidney transplant.
“We explored the perspectives of the participants and discovered that they all desperately want to lose weight. They are painfully aware that losing weight is necessary to get a kidney transplant,” Freeman and colleagues wrote. “The participants expressed that they want help to eat healthier and within the restrictions that come with their kidney disease. They want support from their surrounding community to exercise more, and they do not want to take on the weight-loss battle on their own.”
According to the researchers, limitations of the study included a small pool of patients and short interviews.
Freeman and colleagues concluded, “Health care professionals should in general be educated to offer more and better support to their patients who are trying to lose weight, and physicians should be more proactive in offering obesity management medications and metabolic surgery options to these patients.”
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