Management of obesity--the practitioner's experience

The successful management of obesity has a number of important components. These will be reviewed under the headings of: (1) Obesity in the wider context of clinical nutrition. (2) Developing and instituting appropriate protocols in a practice, for obesity counselling and weight reduction programmes. (3) The practical aspects of the ongoing management of obesity cases on an individual pet/client basis--the successes and failures. The institution of obesity controls for overweight pets should be recognised as an important opportunity to develop and expand veterinary care services. There is good evidence that clients need to receive both authoritative and competent advice on all aspects of nutrition for their pets. This advice can range from nutrition of the healthy pet in all its life stages, to the specific nutritional needs at times of illness as an important adjunct to medical management of disease. Included here must necessarily be obesity control. The veterinarian is not always recognised as a person who would provide advice on feeding a normal healthy pet. The usual source of advice would be the pet shop who would probably be the vendor of food also. The advice which the pet owner then receives is unlikely to be accurate or have any basis derived from proper nutritional training. This highlights a need to change pet owners' perceptions of the value of Veterinary Nutritional Advice and its availability at the practice. It is often only at times of illness that the pet owner has a need to consult the veterinarian who then has an opportunity to introduce the concept of proper nutritional management.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)