PreWel Qualitative Study 1.0

• Research type

  Research Study

• Full title

  A qualitative study of patients and health care professionals needs and preferences for weight management before surgery

• IRAS ID

  353079

• Contact name

  Claire Madigan

• Contact email

  c.madigan@lboro.ac.uk

• Sponsor organisation

  Loughborough University

• Duration of Study in the UK

  1 years, 2 months, 18 days

• Research summary

  Background to the research
  Patients can wait for two years or more for their surgery. This is a long time, and their health is getting worse during this wait, which may mean they are less ready for their surgery when the time comes. Living with obesity may make the surgery more difficult for the surgeon, increases risks and patients may recover more slowly.
  Losing weight before surgery could have many benefits, from getting the surgery quicker and better recovery, to lowering the risk of heart disease and death.

  This research study is part of a programme of research aiming to explore whether weight loss before surgery is beneficial. The current study aims to find out patients and health care professionals views are about weight loss before surgery and which weight loss programmes would patients like to use. Then we will look at how that will fit in current care systems.

  We will interview patients and health care teams to identify which weight loss programme(s) should be offered to patients before surgery. We will then come together as a larger team to decide which programmes we should test. We will not create a new programme, instead use ones already available.

  Patient and public involvement
  People who recently had surgery/waiting for surgery helped design this research and helped to write the patient facing materials. The group are involved in the design, analysis and writing up of the findings.

  How will we share our findings?
  Via co-developed outputs on websites, presentations with stakeholders, blogs, infographics, peer reviewed publications and other methods suggested by our public group.
  

• REC name

  North West - Haydock Research Ethics Committee

• REC reference

  25/NW/0342

• Date of REC Opinion

  20 Nov 2025

• REC opinion

  Further Information Favourable Opinion