A recent study from Pennington Biomedical Research Center has found that bariatric surgery, also known as metabolic surgery, is more effective in achieving remission of type 2 diabetes than medications and lifestyle changes.
The study also suggests that the remission lasts longer with surgery. These findings have been published in the journal Diabetes Care.
Context of the Study
Type 2 diabetes affects more than 34.2 million Americans, or 10.5 percent of the population, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Obesity plays a significant role in the development of diabetes, with about 90 percent of people with type 2 diabetes being overweight or obese.
Both obesity and diabetes present enormous health burdens at individual and societal levels.
The Research
The study evaluated 316 patients with type 2 diabetes to determine the effectiveness and duration of metabolic surgery results.
It is the largest study of its kind to assess metabolic surgery as a treatment for type 2 diabetes.
John Kirwan, Ph.D., Pennington Biomedical’s Executive Director, stated that despite the growing consensus about the effectiveness of metabolic surgery in treating type 2 diabetes, many health insurers don’t cover the surgery due to the lack of a large, randomized controlled trial that considers the longevity of the surgery’s results compared to medications and lifestyle changes.
The Findings
Dr. Kirwan noted that even with access to education on nutrition, exercise, self-monitoring, and the newest diabetes medications, only 2.6 percent of patients achieved diabetes remission during the study.
However, 37.5 percent of patients who underwent metabolic surgery had achieved lasting remission three years later.
The study also found that metabolic surgery was superior to medication and lifestyle changes in lowering HbA1c, fasting glucose, body weight, and other cardiovascular risk factors, with significantly fewer medications.
Implications
Despite the potential benefits of metabolic surgery, less than one percent of eligible individuals undergo the treatment, possibly due to concerns about long-term safety and lasting results from both patients and their healthcare providers.
Dr. Kirwan expressed hope that the findings would encourage physicians to recommend bariatric surgery more confidently to their patients and persuade health insurers to recognize the health benefits and potential cost savings associated with covering metabolic surgery.
If you care about diabetes, please read studies about leading cause of death in type 2 diabetes, and if you have diabetes, coffee and green tea may help you live longer.
For more information about diabetes, please see recent studies about Keto diet could help control body weight, blood sugar in type 2 diabetes and results showing that blueberries strongly benefit people with metabolic syndrome.
The study was published in Diabetes Care.
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