Research
Adherence
Adding exercise or behavior therapy to a diet improves weight loss and risk factors for at least 1 year.
Combine your diet with exercise or behavior therapy to get better weight loss and risk factor improvements for at least a year compared to diet alone.
GoodSupportsHIGH confidence
The addition of an exercise or behaviour programme to diet was associated with improved weight loss and risk factors for at least 1 year.
Why this rating
Based on systematic review of RCTs.
Source
Systematic review of the long-term effects and economic consequences of treatments for obesity and implications for health improvement
Alison Avenell et al. · Health Technology Assessment · 2004
DOI 10.3310/hta8210
Meta-analysisCited 1,037×
Read the paper DOI resolved against Crossref · corpus check 2026-06-10
More from this paper
- The addition of orlistat or sibutramine to a weight maintenance diet is associated with significant weight loss and generally improved cardiovascular risk factors in adults with obesity.Good
- Low-fat diets are associated with continuing weight loss for up to 3 years, prevention of type 2 diabetes, and improved control of hypertension.Good
- Targeting surgery on people with severe obesity and impaired glucose tolerance is likely to be more cost-effective, at £2329 per additional life-year.Moderate
Related findings · Adherence
- Regular physical activity (at least 150 minutes/week of moderate-intensity) reduces all-cause and cardiovascular mortality by 20-30% and lowers the risk of type 2 diabetes by 25-35%.Strong
- Increasing physical activity from a sedentary lifestyle to an active one in middle adulthood significantly reduces the risk of coronary events compared to remaining sedentary.Strong
- Resistance exercise is the only intervention capable of consistently restoring muscle function and strength in sarcopenia, partially overcoming age-related anabolic resistance.Strong
This is one finding among thousands. Every one is graded and traced to its source, so you can see what the evidence actually supports. Browse the research →