Severely obese patients who undergo gastric bypass surgery significantly reduce their risk of death from coronary heart disease, diabetes, and cancer, according to research published in the Aug. 23, 2007, issue of The New England Journal of Medicine.
The study was led by a team of researchers from the University of Utah School of Medicine and LDS Hospital.
The 14-year study evaluated 15,850 severely obese patients, half of whom underwent gastric bypass surgery to reduce their weight. The mortality rate from coronary heart disease was 56 percent lower in the surgery group than in the non-surgery (control) group. The surgery group also showed a 60 percent lower death rate from cancer and a 92 percent lower death from diabetes than the non-surgery group, according to Ted D. Adams, Ph.D., M.P.H., the study's lead author,
Adams is a professor in the Division of Cardiovascular Genetics at the University of Utah School of Medicine and co-founder of the Intermountain Health and Fitness Institute at LDS Hospital in Salt Lake City.
While mortality rates for specific diseases were lower in the surgery group, Adams said mortality rates from other causes such as accidents and suicide were 58 percent higher among those who had the weight loss surgery than the control group.
This study helps to further define the effects of gastric bypass surgery on long-term mortality. Reduction in death by any cause, and disease-specific deaths such as coronary heart disease, diabetes, and cancer were significantly reduced in surgery patients compared to the non-surgical control group, he said.However, rates of death not caused by disease were shown to be greater in those who underwent the weight-loss surgery when compared to controls.