Minimally invasive surgery for morbid obesity has favorable outcomes, according to University of Pittsb...( rally 70 to 75 percent of the excess we...),Health

Patients in the study ranged in age from 17 to 68. They averaged over 300 pounds prior to surgery. Many of the patients had numerous other medical problems including sleep apnea, diabetes, depression and cardiopulmonary disease. Some 63 percent had prior abdominal surgery.

"Although one patient died from a pulmonary embolus, the early surgical complication rate was only 3.3 percent for major complications and 27 percent for minor complications," Dr. Schauer said. "Following surgery, excess weight loss at 24 and 30 months was 83 percent and 77 percent respectively. In patients with more than one year of follow-up, most of their comorbidities were improved or resolved, and 95 percent of the patients reported significant improvement in their quality of life."

For example, 64 of the pre-operative patients had osteoarthritis/degenerative joint disease. Following surgery, 47 percent said their condition was improved and 41 percent said it was resolved. For those with hypertension (57 patients), 70 percent said it was resolved following gastric bypass surgery. Diabetics, who often required over 100 units of insulin per day, had the most profound improvement with an 83 percent cure rate. The remaining 17 percent were vastly improved.

"The laparoscopic approach appears to result in rapid recovery in terms of the indices evaluated in our study, allowing patients to return to full activity quickly," Dr. Schauer said. "This is particularly important in the morbidly obese patient, who often is limited in daily living activities before surgery and thus may have significant difficulty after surgery as well.

"The important outcomes relating to the goal of open bariatric surgery such as weight loss and improvement of comorbidities and quality of life appear to be equally favorable for minimally invasive gastric bypass. Long term follow-up, however, will be necessary to confirm that the laparoscopic approach is equally
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Contact: Frank Raczkiewicz
raczkiewiczfa@msx.upmc.edu
412-624-2607
University of Pittsburgh Medical Center
15-Oct-2000