Analysis of medical appointments for patients with overweight and obesity in a public hospital of Lima, Peru: a cross-sectional study of audio-recorded consultations

Objective: To describe the content of overweight and obesity counseling performed in a public Peruvian hospital. Methods: We audio-recorded 40 visits of patients with overweight or obesity from the internal medicine, cardiology, endocrinology, and family medicine services at Cayetano Heredia Hospital. Fragments of the recordings in which counseling was performed were transcribed and codified. We established a checklist to score each counseling session and performed descriptive analyses. Results: Complete counseling (including weight, nutrition, and physical activity) was performed in 32.5% of consultations. The average time spent in counseling was 1.72 minutes. Counseling on weight loss was performed in 65% of consultations, nutrition in 65%, and physical activity in 35%. On average, 8 of 26 checklist items were fulfilled per appointment. Weight loss goals were established in 15% of visits. The most frequent diet recommendations were eating more fruits and vegetables (32.5%) and eating fewer carbohydrates (30.0%). Suggested physical activities were walking (10.0%), running (7.5%), and playing any sport (7.5%). Conclusions: Complete counseling was only addressed in one-third of the appointments, and most counseling was superficial without considering therapeutic goals. This suggests the need to include lifestyle counseling in consultations, regardless of the medical specialty or patient’s background condition.