Abstract Obesity affects more than 40% of United States adults, yet access to specialty care remains limited. Nurse practitioners increasingly manage obesity in primary care, but traditional approaches often emphasize weight loss alone, overlooking psychosocial factors such as body image and internalized weight bias. These gaps contribute to weight stigma, which negatively impacts patient engagement, mental health, and treatment outcomes. This article outlines 6 practical strategies for nurse practitioners to reduce stigma and integrate body image principles into care, including education, self-reflection, holistic goal setting, positive body image promotion, screening, and referral pathways. Implementing these steps supports comprehensive, stigma-informed obesity management.
Sneed et al. (Thu,) studied this question.