An evaluation to review the effectiveness of an established residential weight management intervention on short-term health outcomes in overweight and obese children and adolescents

Background Overweight and obesity are rapidly escalating to epidemic proportions in the paediatric population. Obesity has profound health and social consequences in both the short- and long-term. Multi-component interventions have been highlighted as the treatment of choice but the current evidence base is limited and many interventions have not been properly evaluated. Objective To review the effectiveness of the Carnegie International Camp (CIC) programme, an established, residential, multi-component weight management intervention, previously demonstrated to be effective across a range of health outcomes for overweight and obese youth (Gately et al., 2005). Methods Replication of the previous evaluative study (Gately et al., 2005); 290 children and adolescents (mean age 13.7 years) participated in one of three successive residential weight management programmes during the school summer holidays of 2006-2008. Design: A prospective cohort study investigation incorporating a quasi-experimental, repeated measures design across a range of physiological and psychological variables associated with overweight and obesity. Measurements were taken before, during and after the intervention period. Comparisons were made with the data from the earlier evaluative study (Gately et al., 2005). Results Significant (p