High blood pressure, particularly when combined with obesity, is a leading cause of death and disability worldwide.
Metabolic surgery, such as gastric bypass and gastric sleeve surgery, has been shown to reduce the risk for many conditions that typically accompany obesity, such as type 2 diabetes, high cholesterol, and sleep apnea, but it was unclear whether surgery is also effective for treating high blood pressure.
In a recent study at Örebro University, researchers found metabolic surgeries are not only effective for treating Type 2 diabetes and obesity.
The surgery also has benefits for people with obesity who have high blood pressure—and can reduce their risk of heart attack, stroke, and death.
The study is published in PLOS Medicine. One author is Erik Stenberg.
In the study, to evaluate whether metabolic surgery has benefits for patients with obesity and high blood pressure, the researchers compared two groups of people with these conditions: one that had undergone metabolic surgery, and a control group that hadn’t.
They found the group that had undergone metabolic surgery had a lower risk of a “major adverse cardiovascular event” such as a stroke, heart attack, or cardiac arrest, and they had a lower risk of dying for any reason.
Overall, 3.2% of the group that had surgery experienced a major adverse cardiovascular event, compared to 4.5% of the control group.
The findings suggest that metabolic surgery is effective at treating hypertension in individuals with a BMI of 35kg/m 2.
Metabolic surgery may not be a global solution to the obesity epidemic, but with these related conditions causing so much death and disease worldwide, surgery should be considered as an effective option for treating patients with obesity and high blood pressure.
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