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Older adults are a diverse population with a wide range of potential health care conditions and needs. Further, as discussed in the Evaluate section, obesity is a chronic, relapsing, multifactorial disease that should ideally be managed with an interprofessional care team (Busetto et al., 2024). Although primary care providers may not be able to address all weight management needs, they can offer relevant referrals and provide guidance on which interventions might be most appropriate for an older adult’s individualized needs.
Additionally, primary care providers can share information about resources that can enhance the likelihood of success and should consider any barriers (e.g., physical, psychological, social, financial, environmental, transportation) that might affect the older adult’s ability to utilize the resources (Burton et al., 2017).
People who receive care through the Veterans Health Administration, Medicare Advantage programs, or national providers such as Kaiser Permanente may have additional options for accessing weight management, dietary, exercise, and psychological services.
Finally, it is important to recognize that while this toolkit focuses on common factors that are addressed as a component of weight management efforts, there are many other factors that can affect weight homeostasis.
These factors include but are not limited to:
A holistic approach to weight management should include the identification of factors affecting individual patients and developing a plan to address them (potentially in collaboration with other providers).
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