Talking With Patients About Weight Without Stigma

This part starts from a common worry among physiotherapists: that bringing up weight will damage the relationship with the patient. The speaker suggests open, genuinely curious questions tied to the reason the patient came in, such as asking what else might be contributing to their symptoms, and exploring past attempts to lose weight, what made them hard and what helped. Asking why is discouraged, because it pushes the patient to justify past behavior. The lesson then covers weight stigma: the belief that people with obesity are lazy or lack willpower, the shift from compliance to concordance, and the Foresight report's picture of obesity as far more complex than eat less, move more. Stigma lowers confidence in providers, weakens communication and adherence, and raises attrition. It closes with reflecting on your own weight bias, treating communication and listening as core skills, and how to respond when a patient says you cannot understand because you are not overweight.