The research reviewed in this article found that severely overweight people who lost weight after weight-loss surgery -- also called bariatric surgery -- lowered their overall risk of developing cancer by 80% during the 5 years after surgery. The women in this study who had bariatric surgery were 85% less likely than severely overweight women who didn't have bariatric surgery to develop breast cancer.
Over 1,000 men and women who were severely obese and had bariatric surgery were followed in this study. Obesity is defined as a body mass index of 30 and over. The researchers followed the health history of these people for 5 years after their surgery and compared them to nearly 6,000 other people who were similar to them in weight and other characteristics, but who did not have bariatric surgery.
In addition to the lower risk of breast cancer in the women who had the weight-loss surgery, people in the study who had surgery lowered their risk of colon cancer by 70%. They also decreased their risks of a variety of other cancers, including pancreatic cancer, skin cancer, uterine cancer, and one type of lymphoma.
For some time now doctors have recognized the link between obesity and cancer risk. Research has shown that weight loss can lower the risk of breast and other cancers. For most overweight people a healthy diet and regular exercise are effective ways to lose weight and enjoy the many health benefits that can accompany weight loss.
For severely overweight people in whom diet and lifestyle modifications have not resulted in necessary weight loss, bariatric surgery can be a good option. There are several approaches to this type of surgery. All of them result in a dramatic decrease in the size of the stomach. This change in stomach size causes people to feel full after eating even small amounts of food, and so their appetite is substantially decreased after surgery. The weight loss seen after bariatric surgery can be quite dramatic. In addition to improvements in overall health and quality of life, the research reviewed in this article suggests that losing weight after bariatric surgery can also substantially decrease cancer risk, including breast cancer risk.
Bariatric surgery is only appropriate for severely overweight people in whom other approaches to adequate weight loss have failed. This type of surgery can result in serious complications during and after surgery, and troublesome side effects during and after recovery. Newer approaches to this type of surgery are lowering the chances of these side effects and complications.
If you are overweight and want to do all that you can to improve your overall health and lower your risks of breast and other cancers, you should talk to your doctor about sensible weight loss approaches for you. Non-surgical approaches to weight loss make sense for most people. If you are severely overweight, bariatric surgery may be an option for you, but this approach should only be considered when you cannot adequately lose weight with other approaches. If you are considering bariatric surgery, work with your doctor to find a surgeon very experienced with the procedure and with the special medical, nutritional, and other types of care required after surgery.
You can find more information about a healthy approach to eating, exercise, and weight loss in the Nutrition section.
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Morbidly obese patients who undergo weight-loss surgery greatly reduce their risk of cancer, according to a study providing fresh evidence of health benefits from these increasingly common operations.
Researchers from McGill University in Montreal found that the people who underwent bariatric surgery saw reductions in particular in the risk for breast and colon cancer. Many people see dramatic weight loss after such surgery.
People who are deemed morbidly obese typically are at least 100 pounds (45 kg) overweight. The researchers tracked 1,035 such patients who had bariatric surgery for five years. They also monitored 5,746 patients who matched the surgery group in age, sex and weight but did not have this surgery.
Those who underwent bariatric surgery had about an 80 percent lower risk of developing cancer, the study showed.
"The evidence is mounting that weight loss through weight-loss surgery, if you are extremely obese, is extremely beneficial both to your health as well as to your quality of life," Dr. Nicolas Christou, McGill's head of bariatric surgery who led the study, said in a telephone interview on Thursday.
In addition to cutting the incidence of breast cancer by about 85 percent and colon cancer by about 70 percent, those who underwent bariatric surgery also saw reductions in the risk for pancreatic cancer, skin cancer, uterine cancer and non-Hodgkin's lymphoma, the researchers said.
Obesity raises the risk for several types of cancer, including cancers of the breast, colon, esophagus and kidney, as well as numerous other diseases.
The study buttresses findings published last year in the New England Journal of Medicine that obese people who have bariatric surgery have a lower risk of death from heart disease, diabetes as well as cancer compared to obese people who do not have such surgery.
Bariatric surgery alters the digestive system's anatomy to cut the volume of food that can be eaten and digested.
In Christou's study, presented at a meeting of the American Society for Metabolic & Bariatric Surgery, most of the patients had gastric bypass surgery, which leaves the stomach smaller and permits food to bypass part of the small intestine.
"There's an old misconception that this is cosmetic surgery. But actually, people who are overweight don't live as long because a lot of them develop weight-related health problems that shorten their lives. What we see in all these studies is that when people lose the weight, their health gets better," said Dr. Daniel Gagne of the Western Pennsylvania Hospital in Pittsburgh, who presented another study at the meeting.
An estimated 205,000 people underwent bariatric surgery in the United States last year.
Other studies unveiled at the meeting also described health benefits in people who lost weight after bariatric surgery.
Gagne's study showed that most patients with asthma and arthritis were able to stop taking steroids to treat the conditions within about a year of having bariatric surgery.
The study involved 49 morbidly obese patients who were taking steroids and other immunosuppressant medications to treat chronic inflammatory diseases and autoimmune diseases.
New York University researchers showed that losing less than half of excess weight within a year of bariatric surgery was enough for patients to see dramatic improvements in type 2 diabetes, hypertension, high cholesterol and sleep apnea.
Breastcancer.org 7 East Lancaster Avenue, 3rd Floor Ardmore, PA 19003
Learn more about our commitment to your privacy
© 2010 Breastcancer.org - All rights reserved.
Breastcancer.org is a non-profit organization dedicated to providing information and community to those touched by this disease. Learn more about our commitment to providing complete, accurate, and private breast cancer information.
