Bariatric Surgery & Death - 30 Days After Surgery

In the May 2006 issue of Archives of Surgery, a study was released that examined the mortality rates of bariatric surgery patients in 29 academic heatlh centers accross the United States. Ninh Nguyen, MD, from the University of California-Irvine Medical Center, Orange, along with a group of colleagues, examined the records of almost 1200 patients of bariatric surgery at the above mentioed medical centers. There were 40 cases from each center that were compiled into data.

A little over 90% of the patients underwent gastric bypass surgery, who were all between the ages of 17 and 65 along with a body mass index between 35 and 70. Gastric bypass is the process of contricting a small portion of the stomach and connecting the resulting pouch directly to the small intestine. The rest of the group recieved restrictive procedures, such as gastric banding which divides the stomach into two smaller parts.

Of the patients that recieved gastric bypass, four died within 30 days of the procedure, which includes 2 that died in the hospital. 16% of the patients developed complications including leakage, blockage, infection, pneumonia, irregular heartbeart and urinary tract infection. 75% of the gastric bypass procedures were perfomed with a laparoscope to create small incisions. This procedure is known to be less invasive, and the resulting data proves it to be much safer: there were no deaths in the first 30 days and complications only appeared in 3.2% of the patients.

In conclusion, the study shows that bariatric surgery performed at high-volume academic hospitals has a lower mortality rate than the general average. It also shows that laparoscopic surgery proves to be a less invasive and safer method than traditional surgery. If one is considering bariatric surgery, an academic hopistal that performs laparoscopic surgery would prove to be the safest bet for the high-risk procedure.