Oral Presentation Australian & New Zealand Obesity Society Annual Scientific Meeting 2013

The psychological profile of bariatric candidates and health-related quality of life after gastric bypass operation: Preliminary results (#107)

Cathrine L Wimmelmann 1 , Michael T Lund 2 3 , Merethe Hansen 2 , Flemming Dela 2 3 , Erik L Mortensen 1 3
  1. Department of Environmental Health, University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen, Denmark
  2. Department of Biomedical Sciences, University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen, Denmark
  3. Center for Healthy Aging, University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen, Denmark

Background Bariatric surgery is the treatment of choice for morbidly obese individuals often resulting in weight loss of 60%-80% of the overweight, improvements in health-related quality of life and cure of obesity-related co-morbidities. However, it has been reported that a significant minority of patients regain weight or have a poor mental health outcome despite losing weight. Psychological factors are believed to influence postoperative health behavior and may play an important role for surgical outcome. To date no preoperative psychological predictors have consistently been identified.

Objectives The aim of this study is to describe the psychological profile of bariatric candidates and to identify psychological predictors of weight loss and mental health after bariatric surgery.

Design A prospective study is planned to include a total of 120 Gastric Bypass patients who complete measures of personality (NEO-FFI), mental symptoms (SCL), health-related quality of life (SF-36), body image (BIQ) and social background two times before and two times after surgery with a follow-up of up to 2 years. Furthermore, an intelligence test (IST-2000-R) is administered preoperatively. In addition, 20 semi-structured qualitative interviews are conducted 2 years after surgery.

Results Preliminary results show that the first patients (n=109) scored higher on the personality domain of Neuroticism (p=.000), had more symptoms of somatization (p=.000), depression (p=.000) and anxiety (p=.000), reduced quality of life (p=.000 for all subscales) and lower intelligence score compared with the general population. After surgery statistically significant improvement in quality of life was observed on all SF-36 subscales (p< .008 or less). Furthermore, the General Severity Index (GSI) of SCL was found to be the main preoperative predictor of postoperative health-related quality of life and mental symptom load.

Conclusions These data suggest that bariatric patients experience pronounced improvements in both health-related quality of life and mental health after Gastric Bypass surgery.