Provision of Psychological Support to the Tier 3 Specialist Weight Management Service

The Weight Management Service requires a psychological therapist who provides support to patients who are registered with the service in the form of CBT to meet the Nice Guidance criteria for a tier 3 service. Audit has evidenced the benefit of this service to patients in terms of learning, weight loss, eating and activity habits and recognising triggers. Patients felt motivated to lose weight and were able to identify strategies, tools, and techniques to manage lapses.

When the Weight Management Service started, local NHS organisations were approached to provide cover through an SLA. Unfortunately, this was not possible to arrange because they were unable to offer any hours. The Bariatric Service had previously worked with Beacon to provide psychological support. The Bariatric Service had also worked with another trust, but this was not so successful and experienced several issues. The Weight Management Service had not recruited to this role because the service was initially for 12 months. As the role is part time it would be difficult to recruit to internally and the Trust does not have the ability to provide the clinical supervision for this post as it is not a mental health service provider. NICE Guidance advises that the psychological therapist input must have an interest in obesity.