Are obese nurses poor role models for patients?

It makes perfect sense that to eat less and exercise more would decrease levels of obesity. It also makes perfect sense that stopping smoking, and drinking less would also dramatically improve health outcomes. But we all know that it is just a tad more complicated than that. Personal responsibilty has to be a major step in tackling the issue. However, there are a multitude of ‘obesogenic’ factors contributing to the increased energy consumption and decreased energy expenditure that are responsible for obesity. • Declining levels of physical labour as populations move from rural to urban settings and abandon walking in favour of driving, labour-saving devices in the home, and the replacement of active sport and play by television and computer games. • Higher levels of food consumption, or an increase in energy density (particularly fat content) of the food we eat. • Social, economic, educational and cultural factors are important underlying causes of obesity, although how they inter-relate to promote or protect against the development of obesity is complex and varies considerably by country. Nursing, as a profession, attracts people from a wide variety of social, economic, educational and cultural backgrounds. It has a long history of a variety of negative health outcomes associated with mental and physical challenges, shift work, an unempowered workforce, bullying, etc. Oversimplifying solutions to obesity by adopting 'the eat less and exercise more and anything else is an excuse' approach, is, in itself, an excuse for not taking an effective multi-pronged approach, which is required. One would have thought that nurses of any experience and wit, would have learned that simply 'telling' people to do something because it is good for them, doesn't always work. Unless, underlying issues are dealt with, this problem will only get worse.

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