Physiotherapist-led weight management for people with osteoarthritis: a scoping review

Objective: To systematically identify the literature surrounding weight management (WM) integration into physiotherapist-led osteoarthritis (OA) care and understand the perceptions of physiotherapists, students and people with OA towards physiotherapist-led WM within OA care.

Method: Eight electronic databases (CINAHL, Cochrane, MEDLINE, PEDro, PsycInfo, Scopus, SPORTDiscus and Web of Science) were searched from inception to 2nd August 2025 to include all forms of primary and secondary research alongside grey literature. Identified records were screened by two independent reviewers against eligibility criteria. Further potentially relevant records were found via hand searching and forward citing of included studies. Data were extracted to (1) descriptively analyse and (2) thematically synthesise the included records.

Results: The search strategy delivered 1806 unique records, of which 79 records met the eligibility criteria. Four key themes were identified: (a) current integration of WM in physiotherapist-led OA care is variable, (b) there are questions regarding scope of practice amongst physiotherapists and people with OA, (c) physiotherapists often lack the confidence and skills to discuss weight and (d) further education on the complexities and delivery of WM for physiotherapists is required. A variety of terms are used in existing literature when describing physiotherapist-led WM interventions.

Conclusion: Available literature on physiotherapist-led WM for people with OA is highly heterogenous. The effectiveness of physiotherapist-led WM requires investigation in multiple settings. The feasibility of including WM education in pre-registration physiotherapy curricula should also be examined. A lack of standardised term describing WM support provided by physiotherapists should be addressed.