Background: Laparoscopic Roux-en-Y gastric bypass (RYGB) and laparoscopic gastric banding (LB) are the 2 most common operations used to treat morbid obesity, but few controlled comparative studies have reported perioperative and long-term outcomes.
Design: Two-cohort pair-matched study.
Setting: Academic tertiary referral center.
Patients: One hundred consecutive morbidly obese patients treated with LB were pair-matched by sex, race, age, initial body mass index, and presence of type 2 diabetes mellitus with 100 patients who were treated with RYGB.
Main outcome measures: Perioperative and postoperative complications, reoperations, and 1-year outcomes, including weight loss, type 2 diabetes resolution, and quality of life.
Results: The RYGB and LB groups had similar characteristics. One-year outcomes were available for 93 patients in the LB group and 92 in the RYGB group. The overall rate of complications was similar in both groups (11 patients in the LB group [12%] vs 14 in the RYGB group [15%]; P = .83), with a higher rate of early complications (≤ 30 days) after RYGB (11 patients [11%] vs 2 [2%] for LB; P = .01) and a higher rate of reoperations after LB (12 patients [13%] vs 2 for RYGB [2%]; P = .009). No deaths occurred. Excess weight loss (36% vs 64%; P < .01), resolution of diabetes (17 patients [50%] vs 26 [76%]; P = .04), and quality-of-life measures were better in the RYGB group.
Conclusions: When performed in high-volume centers by expert surgeons, RYGB has a similar rate of overall complications and lower rate of reoperations than LB. With the benefit of greater weight loss, increased resolution of diabetes, and improved quality of life, RYGB, in these circumstances, has a better risk-benefit profile than LB.