FEATURES
YOU ARE why you EAT
It’s not what you eat, it’s why, explains Claudia McGloin
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CLAUDIA MCGLOIN
Claudia McGloin is a registered nurse and holds dual registration in both the UK and Ireland. With more than 27 years’ nursing experience, McGloin is the clinical director and nurse practitioner at The New You Clinic in Sligo..
Obesity is a growing global health crisis, yet traditional approaches to weight management continue to focus predominantly on what patients eat rather than why they eat. This narrow focus often undermines long-term success, leading to frustration for both patients and clinicians. To improve outcomes in aesthetic medicine and beyond, it is critical to explore the underlying psychological, hormonal, and behavioural drivers of eating.
By 2025, over one billion people worldwide will be living with obesity, including more than 200 million children and adolescents. Since 1990, adult obesity rates have more than doubled, and adolescent obesity has quadrupled. Approximately 43% of adults globally are overweight, and the problem extends deeply into childhood, with nearly one in five children affected.1-2
Obesity is more than a cosmetic concern; it significantly increases the risk of type II diabetes, cardiovascular disease, non-alcoholic fatty liver disease, and various cancers.3 It also places a substantial economic burden on healthcare systems, with related costs projected to surpass $2 trillion (£1.49 trillion) globally by 2025.4