Treating Diabetes Via Weight-Loss Surgery
HealthNews, 18th August 2010
The number of people suffering from diabetes increases dramatically. The CDC investigators say that it will double in the next 25 years from 23.7 million to about 44.1 million in 2034. The cost of treating diabetes is expected to triple from $113 billion $336 billion.
Dr. Elbert Huang says the situation becomes more and more dramatic and that we should change immediately the dietary and exercise habits in order to find more effective and less expensive ways of treating diabetes.
As Type 2 diabetes is an obesity-related disease, doctors recommend that losing weight will improve the situation or, in some cases, even heal it. Studies show that both exercising and weight-loss surgery are able to lower the diabetes.
Johns Hopkins from University School of Medicine found out in his latest study that about 75% of patients who had bariatric surgery for weight loss eliminated their diabetes medications within 6 months and almost 85% of patients remained off diabetes medications two years later.
This research showed that not only diabetes can be treated effectively, but also the health care cost can be dramatically reduced with weight-loss surgery. In America the average cost of treating a patient before surgery was $6,376 up to two years before surgery. That increased to $10,592 in the year leading up to surgery. In the year following weight loss surgery, the cost per patient was $6,992, fell to $4,197 in the second year, and fell even further to $1,878 three years after surgery.
The study that appeared in the American Journal of Managed Care in 2008, showed that the average monthly medical costs for the people who had laparoscopic bariatric surgery were approximately $900 lower than those people who did not, roughly a year after the procedure. Those participants in the study who had the surgery showed a decrease in medical conditions common to obese patients, such as hypertension, diabetes, and sleep apnea.
