PURPOSE To test the effects of employer subsidies on employee enrollment, attendance, and weight loss in a nationally available weight management program. DESIGN A randomized trial tested the impact of employer subsidy: 100%; 80%, 50%, and a hybrid 50% subsidy that could become a 100% subsidy by attaining attendance targets. TRIAL REGISTRATION NCT01756066. SETTING AND PARTICIPANTS Twenty ...

Over the past twenty years, obesity has become a major topic of concern. In particular, this paper estimates that the number of obese adults has risen from around 2.0 million in 1992/93 to about 3.1 million in 2005. With the prevalence of obesity on the rise, the associated economic cost is also increasing significantly. The annual cost of obesity in 1992-93 was estimated at around 840 million ...

OBJECTIVE In behavioral studies of weight loss programs, participants typically receive interventions free of charge. Understanding an individual's willingness to pay (WTP) for weight loss programs could be helpful when evaluating potential funding models. This study assessed WTP for the continuation of a weight loss program at the end of a weight loss study. METHODS WTP was assessed with mon...

Background A number of commercial diet and exercise programs are promoted to help people lose weight and improve fitness. However, few studies have compared the effects of following different types of exercise and diet interventions on weight loss. The purpose of this study was to compare the efficacy of a more structured meal plan based diet intervention and supervised exercise program that in...

This study tested if a therapeutic weight loss diet or presentation of diet to owners would influence owners’ assessment of their dog’s satiety. Twenty-three overweight, but otherwise healthy, dogs were fed their usual diet and then a study diet with both a positive and neutral description in a randomized crossover design. Diets were fed in amounts to meet dogs’ resting energy requirements to m...

BACKGROUND An estimated two-thirds of North Carolina residents are overweight or obese. Mass media, such as newspapers and the Internet, can be used to broadly convey health messages for weight loss. CONTEXT Newspapers have traditionally been a primary source of health information for the general public. They may be uniquely suited to initiate and manage a community-based weight loss program ...

Risk factors for arterial stiffness progression have not been well characterized. We examined the relationship between arterial stiffness progression and body weight and weight gain in a group of healthy young adults. Aortic pulse-wave velocity was assessed at 2 time points approximately 2 years apart in 152 white and black adults aged 20 to 40 years, and was standardized by the time between vi...

This analysis investigated if changes in autonomous or controlled motivation for participation in a weight loss program differed between individuals offered a financial incentive for weight loss compared to individuals not offered an incentive. Additionally, the same relationships were tested among those who lost weight and either received or did not receive an incentive. This analysis used dat...

This experiment evaluated the efficacy of television delivery of a behavioral weight reduction program. Seventy-one overweight adults were randomly assigned to a live-contact weight loss group that was videotaped for viewing by other groups, a live-contact group that was not videotaped, a television-delivered group that observed the videotaped weight loss sessions, or a waiting-list control gro...