BOSTON – A state-run center focused on patient safety and medical-error prevention has issued updated recommendations on weight-loss surgery, noting that the number of such operations is increasing rapidly, and less-invasive surgeries have become the norm.
Nationwide, the number of weight-loss operations climbed 800 percent between 1998 and 2004, and between 2005 and 2006, it grew another 11 percent to more than 200,000. The fastest growth has been among adults aged 55 to 64, with a 20-fold increase between 1998 and 2004.
In Massachusetts, the number of weight-loss operations climbed from 200 to 3,036 procedures between 1998 and 2004. Between 2004 and 2006, it grew another 14 percent to 3,447.
The new report, issued by the Betsy Lehman Center for Patient Safety and Medical Error Reduction’s Expert Panel on Weight Loss Surgery, shows a trend toward the use of procedures that not only restrict stomach size, as with laparoscopic banding, but also reroute part of the digestive tract, as is done with laparoscopic gastric bypass, the most commonly performed weight-loss surgery in the nation. (READ MORE)
