What Characterizes Successful Weight Maintainers?

Long-term maintenance of weight loss is certainly not common but it does occur, and a significant minority of patients maintain losses of 5 kg or more 3 to 5 years later.

Abstract

Long-term maintenance of weight loss is certainly not common but it does occur. In any study of 100 patients, a handful maintain their full weight loss 3 to 5 years later, and a significant minority maintain losses of 5 kg or more (Kramer, Jeffery, Forster, & Snell, 1989; Wadden, Sternberg, Letizia, Stunkard, & Foster, 1989). These individuals are usually overlooked, however, in the justifiably gloomy reports of the failures of dieting, and they are hard to characterize because of their few numbers.