Weight Loss Surgery Reduces Risk Factors for Heart Disease, Diabetes

In teenagers, laparoscopic gastric banding surgery for treatment of extreme obesity can significantly improve and even reverse the metabolic syndrome, a new study found. The results were presented at The Endocrine Society’s annual meeting.
 
An increasing number of obese adolescents have the metabolic syndrome, said a study coauthor, Ilene Fennoy, MD, MPH, a pediatric endocrinologist at Columbia University Medical Center in New York.
 
In the new study, 24 morbidly obese teens aged 14 to 17 underwent laparoscopic gastric banding (Lap-Band). This minimally invasive weight loss surgery uses a band that can repeatedly be adjusted to make the stomach smaller.
 
Six months after the operation, patients had a statistically significant decrease in their body mass index as well as their waist circumference and blood levels of C-reactive protein, a measure of inflammation that is linked to increased risk of cardiovascular disease. These improvements continued for one year in the 12 patients whose follow-up was that long.
 
Other features of the metabolic syndrome improved rapidly in the first six months and continued to a year, but with “less dramatic” changes, the authors reported.
 
Five patients with 12-month follow-up met the criteria for a diagnosis of the metabolic syndrome before surgery. Only two still had this diagnosis a year later, a decrease in prevalence from 41.7% to 16.7%.
 
“Laparoscopic gastric banding surgery may be a useful intervention for morbidly obese teenagers to decrease the risk of early development of cardiovascular disease and other illnesses related to obesity,” Fennoy said.
 
Source: Endocrine Society