David R. Flum, M.D., M.P.H., of the University of Washington, Seattle, and colleagues conducted a study to determine the risk of all-cause early post-surgical death.
Advancing age and male sex were associated with early death after bariatric surgery, with the highest rates of early death among older men. Overall, men were more likely to die after bariatric surgery than women (3.7 percent vs. 1.5 percent, 4.8 percent vs. 2.1 percent, and 7.5 percent vs. 3.7 percent for men and women at 30 days, 90 days, and 1 year, respectively).
"There may be several reasons for these findings. Older patients do not tolerate surgical stress as well as younger patients and may also have less benefit after surgery than younger patients because much of the impact of obesity on organ systems, such as the heart, may have occurred by the time of the operation. It also remains to be seen if surgical weight loss in older patients decreases utilization of health care resources, improves functional status and quality of life, or extends survival as has been suggested in studies of younger patients," the authors write.
