Abdominal Size Reduction Effect of Obesity Management Program Using Meta-analysis

Abstract

This study synthesized the results of individual studies that verified the effect of the obesity management program on reducing abdominal size, conducted a systematic meta-analysis, and then reinterpreted the result of the analysis. Data collection included only individual studies published from January 2003 to March 2022, and through the screening process, a total of K=57 papers were used as final analysis targets. First, the effect size of the d value, which verified the mean difference between each individual study, ranged from minimum–5.7 to maximum 18.994 with two studies that showed significant effects of 8.0 or higher, and there were 2 studies that showed significant effects of 8.0 or higher and 7 studies showing small effects of 0.1 or lower. Secondly, the total effect size of abdominal circumference was 77%(0.77), and it was verified that the magnitude of intermediate effect in confidence interval is a minimum of 68%(0.68) to a maximum of 83%(0.83) in the 95% confidence interval. Thirdly, with regard to publication bias in the abdominal circumference, symmetry can be visually confirmed. As the rank correlation test yields the value of p at 0.0597, and thus p is greater than 0.05, the likelihood of publication bias appears low. As a result of the above research, it was confirmed that the obesity program was effective in reducing abdominal size.