LIFESTYLE MEDICINE IN FOCUS

A new national report on social connection highlights the scale of disconnection across the United States and its impact on health.

Drawing on responses from more than ten thousand adults, the survey found that forty-one percent feel lonely at least some of the time. Many also reported having limited social networks, infrequent contact with close relationships, and low participation in community or group activities.

These indicators matter for health. Research shows that social isolation and loneliness are linked with increased early mortality and poorer mental and physical health outcomes. Despite this, the report also identifies positive signs, including that most adults feel a sense of belonging in their local community and perceive neighbours as willing to help each other.

For the lifestyle medicine community, these findings highlight the importance of recognising social factors in patient care. While clinicians may have limited control over these factors, understanding a patient's social context and using social prescribing to connect them with supportive community resources can complement core lifestyle interventions such as nutrition, physical activity, and mental wellbeing.

A new Nature Medicine Study suggests that completing the NHS Diabetes Prevention Programme (NHS DPP) may have benefits beyond diabetes itself.

In a cohort of more than 113,000 adults with prediabetes, those who completed the programme had roughly a 50 per cent lower risk of developing type 2 diabetes over two years.

Completers were also less likely to develop a range of other long-term conditions linked to nutrition, activity, and weight, and were less likely to progress to having multiple long-term conditions.

For the lifestyle medicine community, these findings add to the growing evidence that supporting behaviour change early can influence long-term health outcomes in ways that extend beyond a single condition.

Other Lifestyle Medicine News and Events

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If you have a query around the subject matter we will happily discuss this with you, do drop us a DM or email: Office@bslm.org.uk as we want to make sure this content is a good fit for you.

New online course from the Institute for Optimum Nutrition

Introducing The Four Horsemen of the Mental Health Apocalypse – a new online course by Patrick Holford.

Discover the key nutritional and functional strategies to support mental health and build confidence in your practice. Perfect for healthcare practitioners, nutritional therapists and dietitians looking to deepen their expertise.

• 3 hours of expert-led learning

• Evidence-informed insights

• Practical guidance for client support

LATEST NEWS AT BSLM

Let's Walk More Update: Reflections from Prof Sir Muir Gray

As part of our Let’s Walk More campaign, Prof Sir Muir Gray reflects on the role of physical activity, especially walking, in reducing the risk of dementia and slowing its progression. Drawing on history, current research, and practical insights, he reminds us that even small steps can make a meaningful difference for brain health.

Read his full reflections and discover how walking can be an easy and effective way to support wellbeing.

BSLM Members Engage with Student Societies

A small group of our Merseyside Members recently met with a university Lifestyle Medicine society to discuss the importance of embedding lifestyle medicine in the undergraduate curriculum. The BSLM team works closely with students and universities to map GMC guidelines, highlight where Lifestyle Medicine plays a key role, and help close gaps in education.

To date we’ve worked with students and universities to host and provide access to Lifestyle Medicine Conferences, Webinars and Study Days and more recently, Student Selected Components (SSC).

Find out more about the support and opportunities available for students on our Future Health Professionals page and get in touch if you would like to explore how your institution can get involved.

New Aligned Organisation: Bags of Taste

We are delighted to welcome Bags of Taste to the BSLM community, joining us in our shared mission to advance lifestyle medicine.

Bags of Taste challenges a common misconception: that poor diets in disadvantaged communities are simply the result of lacking cooking skills or money. In reality, most people already know how to cook basic meals, and affordability is not the primary barrier.

The real obstacles are psychological and behavioural - low confidence, competing priorities, and the perception that cooking is difficult, time‑consuming, or unrewarding. Traditional cooking lessons rarely shift these entrenched beliefs, which is why their impact on long‑term diet quality is limited.

Bags of Taste is different. Our mentored, home‑based programme dismantles these barriers by supporting participants to plan when they will cook, who they will cook with or for, and how to integrate new habits into daily life. This personalised, behaviour‑change approach consistently leads to sustained improvements: participants cook more from scratch, reduce reliance on takeaways, and save an average of £18 per week.

By addressing the socio‑economic determinants of health and embedding evidence‑based behaviour change techniques, Bags of Taste delivers measurable outcomes in both wellbeing and financial resilience. For BSLM members, it represents a scalable, community‑driven intervention that aligns directly with lifestyle medicine’s mission to tackle chronic disease through upstream, preventive action.

Reflections from Dr Sue Smith and Dr Zabed Hussain- Motivational Interviewing: A Core Skill for Delivering Lifestyle Medicine in Primary Care

This year we reflect on our two BSLM-supported workshops that brought together theory, practice, and collaboration earlier in 2025 as we explored the science of behaviour change alongside the pillars of lifestyle medicine and the essence of motivational interviewing (MI), a core skill that can be learnt and refined with experience in application. Designed specifically for GP trainees, the sessions focused on behaviour change and how MI can transform routine consultations into opportunities for patients to make meaningful and sustainable health changes.

MI is a particular way of talking with people about change and growth to strengthen their own motivation and commitment. It involves clear principles, tasks and skills. All sitting with the ‘Spirit of MI’ at its centre. With skilled use MI can be transformational for both the clinician and their patients, especially when navigating the behaviours that can so often hold us back from optimising the lifestyle medicines known to positively impact short- and long-term health and wellness.

It is truly a core practice we believe is essential for any health-care professional wanting to use Lifestyle medicine in the short moments of interaction we have and so we were very happy to be given the opportunity to delve further into this with aspiring GPs.

The workshops were deliberately interactive, giving participants the chance to practise MI techniques with colleagues, work through examples, and reflect on their own consultation styles. At the outset, the trainees rated the importance of behaviour change conversations at an impressive 9/10, yet their confidence sat at just 5/10. By the end of the session this had risen to 8/10 — a clear sign of how confidence grows when clinicians have the space to learn and try out core skills in a supportive environment.

The feedback mirrored this shift. Participants described the experience as highly engaging, with every attendee rating the content as either excellent or good. Many commented on how much their understanding had improved, with the majority reporting that this improvement was “a lot.” All participants felt they had gained new skills and increased their confidence, and many emphasised just how valuable the practical elements were — especially the opportunity to work through interactive scenarios and practise with colleagues. 100% found it engaging with several as very engaging, with the overall experience as both enjoyable and directly relevant to everyday general practice.

There was also a helpful suggestion for the future: participants were keen for even more examples and scenarios, reflecting their appetite for further practical application.

Comments such as “Thank you very much,” “Improved my confidence overall,” and “Very satisfied with this seminar” captured the overall feeling in the room — appreciative, energised, and motivated to learn more and put these skills into action.

It was a pleasure to be part of this and most importantly linking it with the desire to successfully embed Lifestyle Medicine into daily practice in primary care.  

Dr Sue Smith - GP, Lifestyle Coach. Dr Zabed Hussain - Consultant in Acute Medicine.

Dr Matthew Sawyer, BSLM’s Planetary Health SIG Lead, recently attended the UKHACC meeting on behalf of BSLM, where a key focus was the National Emergency Briefing held in November.

Following the briefing, organisers are encouraging supporters to help maintain momentum online.

A Post National Emergency Briefing Social Media Content Pack is now available, with ready-to-use posts and graphics that can be shared across platforms.

By sharing this content, you can help widen reach, raise awareness, and support calls for a televised national emergency briefing. Even a single share helps push this conversation forward.

In case you haven’t seen it, a new lifestyle medicine feature has been published in RCPCH Milestones. The article highlights the growing role of lifestyle medicine in paediatrics and the work of the Paediatric Lifestyle Medicine Special Interest Group in promoting prevention and healthy habits for children and young people.

A huge thank you to Paediatric SIG Co-Lead Dr Seb Gray for sharing this article, written by his SIG Co-Lead Dr Saras Hosdurga and Dr Sunil Kumar, Clinical Lead of our Prehabilitation SIG.

What's happening in our communities?

We have come to the end of our Recovery in Action webinar series for 2025, delivered by our Voice of Lived Experience team, and would like to thank everyone who joined us over the past few months. The series brought together people living with, or recovering from, chronic conditions to share their experiences and reflect on how lifestyle medicine has supported their journeys.

As BSLM’s first patient focused webinar series, it created a space for open conversation, shared learning, and meaningful connection through lived experience. We are grateful to everyone who contributed their time, insight, and honesty to make the series such a positive and supportive experience.

Live Well East Lothian Update

Is there something like Live Well East Lothian that you refer your patients to, or something that instills a sense of community and wellbeing? Let us know below, we'd love to share initiatives like this one near you!

FEATURED BSLM EVENTS

Head to the dedicated BSLM events page for the full list of upcoming events...

Our Monthly Webinar was on hold for December..

          .. we look forward to welcoming you again in January!

Our previous webinars are below if you want to catch up on them! 

Schedule the following in your diary for January 2026!

Webinar : BSLM & How We Work with Business | 19th January | Online Zoom Webinar

Join BSLM Executive Director, Dr Fraser Quin & COO Emma Mulligan, to hear more about why we deal with business, who we deal with and how.

Key Concepts in Research Design – An overview of the steps involved in planning a research project | 27th January | Online Webinar 

This one-hour seminar will provide an overview of the steps involved in planning a research project. This seminar is open to anyone with an interest in research and evidence-based practice.

Lifestyle Medicine in Practice Seminar |  10th February 9:30-4:30 | Online Zoom Webinar

This event will showcase Lifestyle Medicine in practice. It will provide the data that lifestyle medicine is the foundation and solution to making a difference in reducing the impact of long-term health conditions for ourselves, and our patients. This event offers 7hrs CPD.

Learning Academy 

This Month’s Learning Academy Update

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year from the Learning Academy team. Looking back at 2025, the learning academy have had an excellent year, with the launch of 5(!!!) new CPD courses, including our Coaching for Lifestyle Medicine, just in time for Christmas! We smashed the 1000 learner barrier with core accreditation, which also won a Brandon Hall Gold award for best certification programme. Thank you all so much for your incredible support. 

We are looking forward to an even more exciting 2026, continuing to support your lifestyle medicine learning and progress. In particular, next year we aim to diversify our offering to meet the needs of a wider range of healthcare professionals, and facilitate a true team approach to lifestyle medicine.

Thought about doing our Core Accreditation?

NHS NETWORKS

Top News Stories in December 

Building the future: premises planning for neighbourhood health centres

The NHS’s 10-Year Health Plan sets out a bold vision to reshape care delivery through the creation of 250 neighbourhood health centres (NHCs) by 2035.…

The state of the nation’s food industry

This report reveals that the food industry finds loopholes in government regulation intended to protect young people from junk food. Outdoor advertising spend by food companies increased by 28%…

Primary and community healthcare support for people living with frailty

A report from the National Audit Office looks at how the NHS identifies and supports people living with or at risk of frailty before they…

Engagement insight report: 10 Year Health Plan

Report detailing the views of members of the public and health and care staff as gathered through the Change NHS engagement process that contributed to…

Email us - office@bslm.org.uk