University offers course to fight obesity

Janice Tibbetts ,  Canwest News Service

TORONTO - In an age of epidemic obesity, the University of Guelph and Humber College in Toronto are creating a new degree in fighting fat, a unique program that a leading health expert says is only a start in turning out professionals qualified to treat the forgotten patients of the health system.

The university and college will jointly offer a four-year degree, beginning next fall, to train students to work with the obese through such courses as nutrition, exercise science, anatomy and the science behind obesity-related diseases.

"There is a crying need,"said Terry Graham, a University of Guelph health and nutritional sciences professor who believes the degree is the first of its kind in Canada.

"If you go to any mall or to any beach in the summertime and take a look at the people, clearly we have an epidemic of obesity."

According to the Canadian Obesity Network, more than 5.5 million Canadian adults and 500,000 children are obese, putting one in five people at increased risk for illnesses such as heart disease and diabetes.

Graham said medical schools give "virtually no training"to aspiring doctors on how to treat the obese so there is a void in the system. Students graduating from the new, four-year undergraduate program will be trained to work independently from medical doctors, focusing on such things as lifestyle modification.

"The family physician should be there to treat the medical aspects of your illness, not giving you advice in terms of how to modify your diet or what type of exercise to do," said Graham.

The new program has already received 430 applications for 60 spots. Graduates will earn a Bachelor of Applied Science in kinesiology from the University of Guelph and a diploma in fitness and health promotion from Humber. They will be qualified to work as personal trainers, kinesiologists, wellness consultants and fitness specialists.

Area Sharma, an Edmonton physician who is widely recognized as an expert on obesity, said there is a dearth of professionals nationwide to treat the overweight.

"There is a dire need for training health professionals across the board,"said Sharma, president of the Canadian Obesity Network. "This is not just dieticians and exercise people, but it's pharmacists, occupational therapists, physiotherapists, and medical doctors approaching obesity like you would any other chronic disease. This has not been offered as a college or a university degree."

Sharma cautioned that the answer to the obesity epidemic, however, does not end at advising people to exercise more and eat less, which he likened to telling a depressed person "to cheer up and take happy pills."

There are "100 different reasons" why people are obese and any treatment must focus on the long term and deal with underlying causes, he said

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