Surgery for Obesity
Demand Soars Amid Scientific, Ethical Questions
Since this article does not have an abstract, we have provided the first 150 words of the full text.
- KEYWORDS:
- bariatric surgery
- ethics, medical
- obesity
As bariatric surgery for the treatment of patients with morbid obesity surges in popularity in the United States, ethical and scientific questions about the approach are mounting.
While bariatric surgery has been performed since the 1960s, improvements in laproscopic methods and a 1991 Consensus Statement by the National Institutes of Health (NIH) that established criteria for eligibility for surgical treatment of morbid obesity opened the door for insurance coverage and set the stage for an explosive increase in its use.
According to the American Society for Bariatric Surgery (ASBS), about 47 000 surgeries for treatment of morbid obesity were performed in 2001. Last year about 63 000 bariatric surgeries were performed and this year an estimated 98 000 will be done. The majority of procedures are: Roux-en-Y gastric bypass, stapled gastroplasty, and adjustable gastric banding—all of which are designed to reduce stomach size and thus control calorie intake (JAMA. 2002;288:2793-2796).
The NIH …
