Background: A common policy response to the childhood obesity epidemic is to recommend that primary care physicians screen for and offer counseling to the overweight/obese. As the literature suggests, this approach may be ineffective; it is important to document the opportunity costs incurred by brief primary care obesity interventions that ultimately may not alter body mass index (BMI) trajectory.
Methods: Live, Eat and Play (LEAP) was a randomized controlled trial of a brief secondary prevention intervention delivered by family physicians in 2002-2003 that targeted overweight/mildly obese children aged 5 to 9 years. Primary care utilization was prospectively audited via medical records, and parents reported family resource use by written questionnaire. Outcome measures were BMI (primary) and parent-reported physical activity and dietary habits (secondary) in intervention compared with control children.
Results: The cost of LEAP per intervention family was AU $4094 greater than for control families, mainly due to increased family resources devoted to child physical activity. Total health sector costs were AU $873 per intervention family and AU $64 per control, a difference of AU $809 (P < .001). At 15 months, intervention children did not differ significantly in adjusted BMI or daily physical activity scores compared with the control group, but dietary habits had improved.
Conclusions: This brief intervention resulted in higher costs to families and the health care sector, which could have been devoted to other uses that do create benefits to health and/or family well-being. This has implications for countries such as the United States, the United Kingdom, and Australia, whose current guidelines recommend routine surveillance and counseling for high child BMI in the primary care sector.