Doctors treat obese patients the same

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In some surveys, doctors have admitted to possessing some bias against overweight and obese patients. Some doctors say they have negative attitudes or dislike treating such patients. Moreover, some patients say they feel disrespected because of their weight. But a new study found no evidence that overweight or obese patients receive inferior care compared with normal-weight people.

The authors of the study, published Tuesday in the Journal of the American Medical Assn., analyzed eight common outpatient quality measures from nearly 70,000 patients who were on Medicare or in the Veterans healthcare system. The measures included things like cholesterol testing, pneumococcal vaccination and several types of cancer screening. There was no evidence that obese and overweight people got less of the recommended care. In fact, they had higher estimates of care for some items, such as diabetes screening.

‘While it may be true that physicians often harbor negative attitudes toward obesity,’ the authors wrote, ‘such attitudes may not be borne out in lower quality of care.’

-- Shari Roan