Background: Obesity and its consequences have now reached worldwide pandemic proportions. Among treatments, bariatric interventions are the most effective for weight reduction. Here, we describe the change in anthropometric measurements (AMs) of 615 adult bariatric procedure patients seen in the private practice of a registered dietitian (RD) in Bogotá, Colombia.
Methods: Observational retrospective study of AMs recorded between 1996 and 2013 for patients who had laparoscopic sleeve gastrectomy (LSG, n = 290), laparoscopic adjustable gastric banding (LAGB, n = 207), and laparoscopic Roux-EN-Y gastric bypass (LRYGB, n = 36) or the non-surgical gastric balloon (GB, n = 82) procedure. Patients had three bimonthly follow-up visits. Paired t tests compared baseline (first) and 6-month (fourth) follow-up visit values.
Results: Differences in AMs between the baseline and fourth visits were statistically significant for the surgical interventions. A mean weight loss of 22 kg, equivalent to a 22% total body weight loss, together with significant reduction of the waist-to-height-ratio (WHtR)(p < 0.001) and body mass index (BMI)(p < 0.001), was observed across all procedures.
Conclusions: The use of multiple AMs enables a comprehensive assessment of body composition in patients who undergo bariatric procedures. Our study is a useful resource for international future reference and highlights the impact that the RD can have on understanding and influencing the effectiveness of bariatric procedures.
Keywords: Anthropometric measurements; Bariatric surgery; Body mass index; Weight loss; Weight to height ratio.