Insurers fully recover the costs of
laparoscopic bariatric surgery in about two years compared to the period of
four years for traditional bariatric surgery, a new study published in the
American Journal of Managed Care (AJMC) found.
The study conducted by a team of economists
and bariatric surgeons led by Analysis Group Inc., compared insurance claims
for more than 3,600 patients who had the bariatric surgery, to other obese
people who did not have the surgery. The participants were matched by age,
gender and the length of time they’d had a diagnosis of morbid obesity.
In the group who went through batritric
surgery, the levels of sleep apnea, hypertension, diabetes decreased, while in
the group who did not have the surgery the levels stayed the same or increased.
“Treating morbid obesity with bariatric
surgery makes clinical sense and now it makes economic sense, even accounting
for potential complications from surgery,” said co-author Henry Buchwald, a
professor of surgery at the University
of Minnesota.
Health care costs for obese patients who
had bariatric surgery dropped while costs for obese people who did not have
weight loss surgery continued to rise.
More than 15 million people in the U.S. are obese.
According to the American Society for Metabolic & Bariatric Surgery
(ASMBS), about 205,000 people had some form of bariatric surgery last year. The
most common forms of weight-loss surgery are gastric bypass and gastric
banding.
“The most cost-effective treatment for
obesity is bariatric surgery,” the researchers concluded, adding that within
two to four years, patients get their money back.
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