Dr. RICCARDO DALLE GRAVE

This study examined the effectiveness of the manual for obesity Perdere peso senza perdere la testa (Losing weight without losing your mind) used in form of guided self-help on 161 patients. Three levels of treatments were compared: (a) guided self-help treatment (GSH); (b) minimal guided self-help treatment (M-GSH); (c) control condition (CC). At the end of the treatment, a significant reduction in body weight was observed in GSH and M-GSH, but not in the CC. At six-month follow-up 32.7% of GSH subjects and 15.1% of M-GSH subjects were able to maintain at least a 5% weight loss. The findings show that GSH is more effective than M-GSH in determining a significant short-term reduction of body weight.