Obesity Research in Europe 2015



ECO 2015logo_200After a very busy last week at the 4th National Canadian Obesity Summit, it is now time for me to check out the work going on in obesity back in Europe at the 22nd European Congress on Obesity in Prague.

A first glance at the jam-packed multi-day program is enough to realise that there is a lot of good obesity research going on across Europe – all the way from basic science to clinical practice and from prevention to health policy.

Attending these two conferences back-to-back should also allow me to get a good sense of the different flavours of these events.

In Toronto at the Canadian Obesity Summit, there was no overseeing the fact that addressing weight-bias and discrimination and a patient-centred approach to obesity management that empowers those living with obesity was front and centre.

Given the greater language and cultural diversity of Europe, the latter may be more difficult to present at the European congress – while researchers may well be comfortable communicating in English as the lingua franca, this may be pose more daunting to people living with obesity from non-English speaking countries.

Nevertheless, I do plan to look for and hopefully hear the voice of those living with obesity echo through the work presented here at the European congress – a voice, without which much of the work presented here will be meaningless.

Stay tuned also on Twitter and Facebook for my updates on ECO2015.

@DrSharma
Prague, Czech Republic