Harvard The Blackburn Course in Obesity Medicine 2025
Education to Optimize Your Care of Adult, Adolescent, and Pediatric Patients with Obesity
Treating Obesity 2025: The Blackburn Course in Obesity Medicine is an online course, using live streaming, electronic Q&A, and other remote learning technologies.
OVERVIEW
Effective treatment of patients with obesity is an important part of modern medical practice. This course delivers practical strategies to optimize the management of obesity and its many complications, and provides the most up-to-date approaches to obesity prevention and treatment.
Highlights of the 2025 program include:
- Update on using the newer GLP-1 based therapies
- Comprehensive evaluation of the patient with obesity
- Precision medicine and dietary approaches to obesity and metabolic disorders
- Medical, endoscopic, and surgical options for the treatment of obesity
- Effective counseling and motivation techniques
- Medical and surgical treatment of children and adolescents with obesity
- Emerging strategies and therapies for genetic obesity
- A guide to virtual care, group visits, private and academic practice models
- Enhancing communication about obesity with patients, referring providers, payers, and the public
- Addressing obesity bias, stigma, and disparities in care
Presented by authorities in medicine, surgery, pediatrics, nutrition, endocrinology, gastroenterology and psychology from the country’s leading obesity treatment centers, this course covers critical topics in the prevention and treatment of obesity and related disorders. It includes didactic lectures and panel discussions to improve participants’ ability to care for patients with obesity. In addition, an Obesity Medicine board review is offered for participants preparing for the American Board of Obesity Medicine board examination.
This course is designed to give health care providers the knowledge to:
- Identify, evaluate and manage patients with high-risk obesity
- Provide lifestyle-based therapies for obesity, including nutritional, physical activity, and behavioral approaches
- Apply effective counseling and behavioral modification techniques
- Apply current pharmacological approaches to the treatment of obesity
- Assess patients for their need and appropriateness for bariatric surgery and determine surgical options
Obesity Medicine Board Review
One day prior to the start of Treating Obesity 2025, we offer a comprehensive one-day review course to help candidates prepare for the American Board of Obesity Medicine (ABOM) certification examination. This course is taught by diplomates of the ABOM, and reviews all the major basic, diagnostic and treatment concepts required for the exam, including:
- Pathophysiology of obesity
- Obesity comorbidities
- Pediatric patient management
- Genetic and syndromic obesity
- Nutrition and exercise assessment and intervention
- Intensive lifestyle and behavioral therapy
- Anti-obesity pharmacotherapy
- Bariatric surgery
360-Degree Education
Patient Care. Reimbursements. Challenging Cases. Global Perspectives.
Fewer than 5% of patients with obesity undergo proper clinical evaluation for this disorder in a clinical setting. Treating Obesity 2025 provides education about obesity, its causes and consequences, and the most effective tools and strategies for its prevention and treatment.
Unique to this program is a 360-degree educational experience, where attendees:
- Hear from authorities in medicine, pediatrics, nutrition, surgery, endocrinology, gastroenterology, and mental health about strategies to optimize care for your patients with obesity
- Learn how to build and maintain a successful Obesity Medicine practice in varied clinical settings, including primary care, multidisciplinary obesity care center, and Obesity Medicine specialty private practice
- Learn about the increasing global burden of obesity-associated disease
- Understand the adverse effect of obesity on the screening, diagnosis, and treatment of diseases related to obesity
- Become more effective at strategic communication with payers, employers, and other policymakers about the benefits and value of targeted obesity treatment
- Get feedback and guidance on your own challenging cases from experienced Obesity Medicine clinicians
- Interact directly with faculty during panel discussions and interactive question and answer sessions
- Prepare for the American Board of Obesity Medicine board examination
Learning Objectives
Upon completion of this course, participants will be able to:
- Apply effective patient counseling and behavior modification techniques as well as support for productive lifestyle change
- Determine the mechanism of action and most effective use of current and emerging pharmacological and medical device-based treatments of obesity
- Assess patients for their need and appropriateness for bariatric surgery, help guide them to appropriate surgical options, and effectively manage their post-operative care
- Incorporate strategies for the prevention and treatment of obesity in pediatric populations
- Apply a greater understanding of the pathophysiology of obesity and its metabolic consequences to improve the care of patients with these disorders
- Address patients with obesity with a greater sensitivity and understanding of the causes, challenges, frustrations, and opportunities for their effective treatment
- Develop and further refine clinical approaches to the patient with obesity
- Identify, evaluate, and manage high-risk patient populations
- Assess patients for their need and appropriateness for lifestyle-based therapies for obesity, including dietary manipulation, optimizing physical activity, stress reduction, improved sleep health, and circadian rhythm preservation
Those participants enrolled in the board review portion of the course will be able to:
- Consolidate knowledge of basic and clinical information within Obesity Medicine in order to comprehensively diagnose and treat patients
- Optimize their opportunity to pass the American Board of Obesity Medicine (ABOM) subspecialty examination
