Book your assessment appointment to join our September groups!
26 Week Program
Our 26-week program is designed for people who have less than 50 pounds to lose. Like all of our groups, this one is a closed group, meaning no one coming and going after we start. You get to be with the same people and staff for all 26 weeks. Everyone gets to know each other which maximizes accountability and support. No other program in the country offers closed groups like this.
52 Week Program
Our 52-week program is designed for people who have 50 or more pounds to lose. Once again, like our 26-week program, this one is closed to maximize accountability and support. You’re in the room with like-minded people who really get it. The 52-week program gives you a chance to raise self-esteem, share the trials and tribulations and shame of a lifetime of excess body weight and body shaming, and breaks down isolation and self-loathing.
Rainbow Program
Our Rainbow program is our Graduate Program for individuals who have completed the 26 week or 52 week programs. It is an ongoing system of 3 month modules where you can continue to join for as long as you like, or if you prefer, take some time off, and then when you think you need a tune-up, you can join us for 3 months. You can join at any time no matter how long it’s been since you graduated from your 26- and 52-week programs. We treat overweight and obesity as a chronic disease and the Rainbow Program fills the need for chronic disease treatment.
What Makes us Different
Closed Groups
Closed groups are one of our most important differences. A closed group means that you are with the same people, and staff, for the entire 26- or 52-week program. You get to be in the room for the entire session with like-minded people who really “get it”. It provides the support and accountability you need to lose weight, and more important, learn how to keep it off. This camaraderie is invaluable.
Closed groups also help the staff get to know you and build on curriculum. If people were constantly coming and going, there would be no good way for the staff to put together a cohesive and effective curriculum. If anyone leaves the group, we do not replace them. We don’t know of another program in the country that offers closed groups for these lengths of time.
Professional Staff
Assigned to each weight loss group is the same behavior therapist (clinical psychologist or licensed social worker), registered dietitian, and exercise physiologist. The staff are all experts in their areas of training. Because they remain assigned to your group for the entire 26- or 52-week program, they get to know you and you get to know them. They are there for you every step of the way.
Experience
We’ve been at this since 1991, more than 20 years. In our previous weight loss program at Mount Sinai Morningside Hospital Weight Loss Program in New York City, 92% of the participants lost weight. We developed the program right from the start and have been running it ever since. It’s our baby. We understand the trials and tribulations of weight loss, and we are familiar and know how to help with the shame, guilt, isolation, body shaming, and self-loathing that goes along with excess body weight and repeated attempts at losing weight, sometimes a lifetime of it.
Commitment
All of our staff are committed to helping you. We all have advanced degrees in our area of expertise, and this is how we earn our living. These aren’t part-time jobs on the side for any of us. This is who we are and what we do. We are fully committed to helping you.
Access to Staff
Each week, on the day of your group session, you weigh yourself first thing in the morning and enter it in our database on our secure web site. That data is downloaded the same day by one of our staff and evaluated. Then you will receive an email, either every week, or every other week, from that staff-person as a check in to find out how it’s going, and you can reply to that for feedback. We also take attendance and evaluate that. It’s difficult to fall through the cracks in our program. We are watching and paying attention. We will help you every step of the way.
Internet Message Board
If you miss a session, or just want to stay in touch during the week with your fellow group members, you can do that on our web site where you can communicate with other group members. We have you for 75-minutes a week, the message boards are a good way to stay connected throughout the week.
Rainbow Group
Rainbow is our follow-up program. Once you graduate from your 26- or 52-week program, you can join a Rainbow group at any time. They run in modules of three months at a time. You can simply keep joining every three months, year-in and year-out, or you can take a break and come back when you feel you need a tune-up. We believe overweight and obesity are chronic diseases, and so we use a chronic disease model to help you. That means we provide you with help for as long as you like. Some of our participants have been in Rainbow groups for more than 10 years.
How Much Weight Will I Lose?
While we can’t predict or guarantee how much weight you’ll lose, here’s what we can tell you:
- 92% of our participants lose weight.
- Our “biggest loser” is a woman in her mid-50’s who lost 112.5 pounds in 52 weeks.
- Our average weight loss is 32.5 pounds in 52 weeks.
- Our average percent of body weight lost in 52 weeks is -9.3 percent (ranging up to 44 percent).
- The total weight loss of all our participants combined since we started the weight loss program 18 years ago is 17,409 pounds and counting.
- Our average decrease in waist circumference in 52 weeks is 5.5 inches (ranging up to 21.0 inches).
Weight Loss Results
We asked 142 graduates of the Mount Sinai Morningside Weight Loss Program how they were doing up to six years out. The majority of them had successful, long-term weight loss results to share.
Considering that 95 percent of all people who lose weight supposedly gain it back, these results are a great indicator of our program’s effectiveness.
- 40.2 percent weighed about the same as when they completed the weight loss program (within 10 pounds)
- 35.4 percent continued losing weight (an average of 24.8 pounds after completing the program)
- 24.4 percent gained (of this group, 64 percent did not weigh more than when they started the weight loss program; people who did weigh more weighed an average of only 10 pounds more)
We recommend no more than 1-2 pounds per week of weight loss. More than that is very difficult to achieve (a calorie deficit of more than 1000 calories a day), and it’s not always safe to lose more. We’re more interested in having you lose weight at a sensible rate that is sustainable in the long run rather than a quick-fix where you lose quickly but then regain quickly.
What does it take to lose weight in our program? How often you show up, patience, commitment, determination, self-compassion, lack of perfectionistic thinking, and most important, resilience, are all important for weight loss in our program.
Program fees
The fee for the 26- and 52-week programs is $65 per session. You pay for the number of sessions in the month at the beginning of each month by credit card through a secure portal. (Mastercard, Visa, Amex, Discover)
You are financially responsible for all sessions in the weight loss program whether you attend the session or not. If your group happens to meet on a federal holiday and the group is cancelled, then you are not charged for that session. You will receive 26 or 52 weeks of treatment; if a group is cancelled due to a holiday, then we add a session at the end so you always get 26 or 52 weeks.