Plan Your Personalized Program For The Canadian Obesity Summit Now
If you are planning to attend the 4th Canadian Obesity Summit in Toronto next week (and anyone else, who is interested), you can now download the program app on your mobile, tablet, laptop, desktop, eReader, or anywhere else – the app works on all major platforms and operating systems, even works offline. You can access and download the app here. (To watch a brief video on how to install this app on your device click here) You can then create an individual profile (including photo) and a personalised day-by-day schedule. Obviously, you can also search by speakers, topics, categories, and other criteria. Hoping to see you at the Summit next week – have a great weekend! @DrSharma Gurgaon, Haryana
What Happens To Patients With Severe Obesity In Hospitals?
With the increasing number of Canadians living with severe obesity (BMIs 50+), it is not unexpected that more of them will be seen in healthcare settings. However, whether or not Canadian hospitals are ready to look after these patients with in the right setting with the right equipment and whether healthcare providers are aware of and sensitive to the special needs of these patients is not clear. This is why, Mary Forhan and her team at the University of Alberta is currently conducting a qualitative and quantitative assessment of exactly what problems patients with severe obesity face in healthcare settings. The study, funded by Alberta Innovates Health Solution (AIHS) will look at the special challenges that these patients present in a range for settings – acute care, cancer, cardiology and rehabilitation. A substudy will also examine the issues faced by kids and adolescent with severe obesity in healthcare settings. Together, this project should lead to a better understanding on how healthcare systems better prepare themselves to deliver compassionate and professional care to adults and children living with severe obesity in Alberta. The learnings will likely also inform healthcare systems elsewhere. For more on this study visit the AIHS website. If you are someone living with severe obesity, who has experienced issues in your healthcare that could have been prevented or addressed with appropriate equipment and/or training, I’d love to hear your story. @DrSharma Edmonton, AB Conflict: I am a co-investigator on this project.
Online Course on Weight Bias With Dr. Sara Kirk
Regular readers will be well of the very real social and health impact of weight bias and discrimination. Now, Sara Kirk of Dalhousie University, Halifax, NS, invites you to join her free Massive Open Online Course (MOOC), on weight bias and stigma in obesity, which will be starting on April 20th 2015 (just a week before the Canadian Obesity Summit in Toronto). The course builds on Kirk’s extensive research in this area and the dramatic presentation that was created from her findings. Participants will be able to explore some of the personal and professional biases that surround weight management and that impact patient care and experience. This will hopefully give health professionals better insight into how to approach individuals experiencing obesity in a respectful and non-judgmental manner and provide strategies to build positive and supportive relationships between health care providers and patients. While targeted at health care providers, the course should also be of interest to anyone interested in learning more about what weight bias is and how it can impact health and relationships. Participants who complete the course requirements can apply for a citation of completion (for a nominal fee). For your FREE registration, please visit the course listing and registration page here. @DrSharma Copenhagen, DK
Guest Post: Feeling Obesity Explores the Role of Emotions in Public Policy
Today’s guest post comes from Michael Orsini, Ph.D., Associate Professor in the School of Political Studies, and currently Director of the Institute of Feminist and Gender Studies at the University of Ottawa. He specializes in the study of health policy and politics. He is seeking support for his project, which explores obesity as a case study along with two other cases (funded by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada). He will be attending the upcoming Canadian Obesity Summit in Toronto and will be meeting with researchers and policy makers who are interested in participating in the project. Emotions are central to public policy, yet we have a limited understanding of their influence. Civil society actors are chided for being too emotional or unable to think rationally about policy issues, while bureaucrats and policy makers are accused of being cold, unfeeling beings unable to express basic emotions such as empathy. In the field of obesity, debates among researchers, policy makers and the general public are characterized by a jumble of complex moral emotions. They can be pitied for their “careless” lifestyles, treated with compassion for inability to make better choices, or become objects of disgust. The roots of obesity are framed in emotion‐ laden terms, with individuals accused of literally ‘eating their feelings’, using food to deal with other, deep‐seated problems. As a societal problem, obesity is difficult to separate from the capitalist system of production. As scholars in the field of fat studies remind us, in our neoliberal age, paradoxically, individuals are exhorted to consumer more and eat less. Talk about a mixed message. The research project I recently began explores how a series of complex moral emotions such as shame and disgust can structure how we think about policy problems, and reminds us that labelling “good” and “bad” emotions might be misguided. The social science literature on obesity has expanded in recent years, with scholars examining the links between obesity as a pressing policy problem and broader neoliberal projects of responsibilization. While there has been prolonged attention to the health effects of obesity, especially as they relate to children, there are growing concerns about “the globalization of fat stigma”, and how policies purported to help obese people might actually compound their stigmatized status. In addition, weight‐related stigma has extended beyond to include countries with previously positive attitudes toward larger bodies. While Canada has yet to invoke… Read More »
Fear of Fat: Promoting Health In a Fat-Phobic Culture
Today I will be attending a Summit on Weight Bias at the University of Calgary, that will explore the the issue of weight-based discrimination and ways to address this – especially in health care settings. It should come as no surprise that weight bias and discrimination are a major barrier to providing proper preventive and therapeutic health care due to the widespread attitudes and beliefs about obesity that exist amongst health professionals and decision makers. The scientific summit, co-sponsored by the Canadian Obesity Network, Campus Alberta, and the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR), is complemented by a public Cafe Scientifique that will be held on Thursday, March 12, 7.00 at the Parkdale Community Association, 3512 – 5 Ave NW, in Calgary. For more information and pre-registration for this free public event, which features Leora Pinhas, MD Child & Adolescent Psychiatrist, Physician Lead, Eating Disorders Unit, Ontario Shores Centre for Mental Health Sciences Assistant Professor, University of Toronto Tavis Campbell, PhD Professor, Department of Psychology and Oncology & Director, Behavioural Medicine Laboratory, University of Calgary Yoni Freedhoff, MD, CCFP Medical Director, Bariatric Medical Institute, Assistant Professor, University of Ottawa click here. @DrSharma Calgary, AB
Watch Dr. Sharma in the News!
Listen to Dr. Sharma!
