Pharmacological Approach
Pharmacological therapy for obesity is an important and evolving component of comprehensive weight management. While lifestyle interventions (such as physical activity, nutrition support, and behaviour change strategies) remain essential, some individuals may benefit from or require anti-obesity medications as part of their initial management plan, particularly when obesity-related complications
or biological factors limit their response to lifestyle-based weight loss interventions.
For physiotherapists, understanding the role and effects of pharmacotherapy is key to supporting patients safely and effectively. Medications that influence appetite regulation, satiety, or energy balance can enhance the impact of physical activity and rehabilitation interventions by promoting functional improvements and adherence to movement-based goals. However, the weight loss associated with these medications can also result in a loss of lean body mass, which may have downstream effects on muscle strength, daily physical function, continence and overall quality of life.
Collaborative care, where physiotherapists work alongside endocrinologists, general practitioners and other health professionals, ensures pharmacological and non-pharmacological approaches are integrated to optimise long-term outcomes and reduce obesity-related health risks.
Advances in Evidence-based Obesity Treatment: New Medications as Companions to Lifestyle Programs - CDC’s Division of Nutrition, Physical Activity, and Obesity Seminar
This webinar, moderated by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), features expert perspectives on recent advances in evidence-based obesity treatment. First, Dr. Alyson Goodman presents on biomedical advances in obesity care, including an overview of new anti-obesity medications and their use alongside behaviour and lifestyle programmes (4:35 to 26:31). Next, Dr. Sarah Armstrong discusses the clinical applications of the newest anti-obesity pharmacotherapies, highlighting challenges in prescribing and emphasising the importance of physical therapy and exercise as complementary components of treatment (26:36 to 39:30). Finally, the webinar concludes with Dr. Ariana Chao, who explores the implications of pharmacotherapy for adult patients living with obesity (39:35 to 52:38).
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Source: Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s Division of Nutrition, Physical Activity, and Obesity.
It is shared with permission from the original content developers for use within the PROMINENCE OER.
Obesity Medications
Professor Carel Le Roux is a Professor of Chemical Pathology with a strong focus on obesity.
This overarching presentation makes the case for a combined approach (medications, exercise, nutritional therapies) to the management of obesity as a disease. It concludes that the future of obesity will include chronic treatment aimed at health gain, not weight loss and this is where exercise has an important role to play.
The new EASO medication management algorithm provides clinicians with practical guidance on aligning individual patient profiles with the evidence-based effects of available medications. Developed through rigorous analysis of randomised controlled trials and grounded in the new EASO obesity framework, the algorithm offers a simplified, clinically relevant tool to improve obesity management in adults.
This resource was developed by the European Association for the Study of Obesity (EASO), and is shared with permission
for inclusion in the PROMINENCE Open Education Resource (OER). For more information, visit easo.org.