Investigation of 3-year follow-up results and eating awareness behaviors of obese individuals consulting to the nutrition counseling center

The aim of this study is to investigate the 3-year follow-up results on weight loss, effective factors and eating awareness behaviors of obese individuals who consulted to the nutrition counseling center in Adıyaman. The research was conducted among 102 adult obese individuals, 62,7% female and 37,3% male; who consulted to the Nutrition Counseling Center for weight loss, lost 10% of their initial weight by dieting and volunteered to participate in the research. The participants were invited back to the Nutrition Counseling Center after 3 years and their anthropometric measurements were taken by the same specialist using the same equipment; their eating awareness were measured by using the eating awareness scale-30 (EAS-30) which is the Turkish-adapted version of the Mindful Eating Questionnaire (MEQ) developed by Framson et al. The mean age of the participants was 38.97±9.44 kg/m², and the mean BMI was 34.87±5.97 kg/m² before the diet, 28.70±6.58 kg/m² after the diet and 30.99±6.52 kg/m² after 3 years. Within 3 years, 33,3% of the participants lost further 19,7% of the weight they lost; 62,8% of them regained 60,3% of the weight they lost and lastly 3,9% of them have maintained their weight after the diet. The mean age of individuals with reduced weight was lower, whereas their education level was higher (p<0.05). The mean general score of eating awareness of all participants was 3.31±0.47; 3.37±0.50 for those whose weight have decreased, 3.76±0.34 for those whose weight did not change and 3.26±0.44 for those whose weight have increased. No statistically significant correlation was found between the participant's eating awareness gene score and weight management (p>0,05). Eating discipline scores of those with reduced weight were found to be significantly higher than those with increased weight p<0.05). It is important for obese individuals who lost weight to adopt adequate & balanced nutrition and increase their physical activity as a lifestyle in order not to regain the weight they have lost for a long time, as well as to improve their conscious on eating awareness.