The Internet can do a lot for you, but don't count on it for supporting your diet. UVM nutrition researchers have evidence that Internet support for people attempting to maintain weight loss is ineffective.
What does bolster success in maintaining weight loss, according to Jean Harvey-Berino, Stephen Pintauro and their colleagues, is continued therapist contact and group support. However, they report, both are difficult to sustain for patient and provider.
While previous research found the Internet to be a feasible vehicle for delivering ongoing weight loss support, the effectiveness was unclear, Harvey-Berino says. Thus, the purpose of this latest study was to investigate the effectiveness of a weight maintenance program conducted over the Internet.
Harvey-Berino studied 122 overweight people, each of whom participated in an intensive, six-month weight loss program. The participants were divided into three groups: an In-Person Support group (IPS), a Minimal In-Person Support group (M-IPS) and an Internet Support group (IS). The IPS group had in-person, biweekly meetings, therapist-initiated phone calls and self-monitoring data submitted via postcards on alternating weeks. The IS group also met biweekly, but over a live Internet chat session. In alternating weeks, they maintained therapist contact via e-mail and filed their self-monitoring data over the Web site. The M-IPS group attended a group support meeting once a month for six months.
After the weight loss program, the study tracked the participants through a year-long weight maintenance program. The study found that members of the IS group gained significantly more weight than the other two groups during the first six months of weight maintenance and sustained a significantly smaller weight loss than both the other groups at the one year follow-up.
"The Internet group did much worse," says Harvey-Berino. "Plus they also told us they didnt like it. They kept saying wed rather be in another group."
Harvey-Berino has launched a new study that attempts to determine what goes wrong with weight loss support via the Internet. "We now need to look at other factors such as social support or missing a therapist," she says.
Others researchers on the project were Paul Buzzell, Elena Ramirez, Mary DiGuilio, Beth Casey Gold and Chris Moldovan.
