In a study presented at the annual meeting of the American Society for Metabolic and Bariatric Surgery as a part of Obesity Week provides some inclination that weight loss surgery does have long-term health benefits. According to their study, nearly a third of Type II Diabetes patients remained symptoms free after bariatric surgery. Six years after surgery, the patients studied reduced their risk of heart attack in the next 10 years by nearly 40%, risk of stroke by 42% and the chance of death in the next five years by nearly 18%.
The same study does show that some patients do regain some of the weight they lost in their first two years following weight loss surgery. According to the study’s researchers, the patients’ health remained more stable and healthy, which makes weight loss surgery as a whole more appealing to insurance companies as a means to treat several medical conditions.
About the Study
The study looked at nearly 604 bariatric surgery patients in Sweden for a period of 15 years. They found that in the first two years following surgery, 72% of the patients achieved remission of their Type II Diabetes and were able to cease taking any medication for the condition. After 15 years, more than half of those patients had the condition again while 31% remained in remission. Diabetes remission is more likely by six times compared to those that have bariatric surgery and those that don’t.
A similar study by the Cleveland Clinic looked at bariatric patients for six years following surgery. Their researchers evaluated 131 obese people with no heart disease and Type II Diabetes. All of these patients had gastric bypass surgery from January 2004 to December 2007. They used the Framingham risk calculator to estimate both the before and after 10-year risks of stroke, kidney disease, heart disease, surgery complications such as poor circulation and diabetic retinopathy as well as death.
In their study they found that patients lost nearly 60% of their excess weight and 61% of these patients experienced diabetes remission. Their findings also reported that 85% of the patients reached recommended blood sugar levels in just three months following bariatric surgery (gastric bypass). The risk of stroke and heart disease (both coronary and peripheral) dropped by nearly 27%.
The Cleveland Clinic study believes that gastric bypass surgery, where the stomach is reduced in size, is the most effective form of weight loss surgery for diabetes patients. The study’s researchers found that gastric bypass surgery itself was associated with a 20%