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The Impact of Pregnancy on Outcomes After Bariatric Surgery

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Abstract

Background

Bariatric surgery is performed mostly on obese women of reproductive age. Many studies have analyzed pregnancy outcomes after bariatric surgery, but only a small number have studied the impact of pregnancy on the postoperative outcomes.

Purpose

To study the effect of pregnancy on outcomes after bariatric surgery in women of childbearing age.

Methods

From January 2010 to October 2017, a retrospective study of a prospectively maintained database was conducted at the University Hospital of Geneva (HUG), where 287 women between the ages of 18 and 45 years had undergone Roux-en-Y gastric bypass (RYGB). A comparison of the results during a 5-year follow-up was performed between women who became pregnant after their bariatric surgery (pregnancy group, n = 40) and postoperative non-pregnant women (non-pregnancy group, n = 247). The two groups were compared for weight loss, complications, and nutritional deficiencies.

Results

The pregnancy group was significantly younger (29.2 ± 5.5 vs. 36.4± 6.3 years, p < 0.001) and heavier (124.0 ± 18.0 kg vs. 114.7 ± 17.1, p < 0.001) compared with the non-pregnancy group at the time of surgery. The percentage of excess BMI loss (%EBMI loss) was similar in both groups during the 5-year follow-up. Complications after RYGB and nutritional deficiencies were nearly identical in the two groups. The interval of time between bariatric surgery and first pregnancy was a median of 20.8 months. Out of 40 first pregnancies, 28 women completed pregnancy successfully with live birth.

Conclusion

Pregnancy after bariatric surgery is safe and does not adversely affect outcomes after RYGB.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. University of Geneva, Geneva, Switzerland

    A. Brönnimann

  2. Division of Digestive Surgery, Department of Surgery, University Hospitals of Geneva, Rue Gabrielle-Perret-Gentil 4, Geneva, Switzerland

    M. K. Jung, N. Niclauss, M. E. Hagen, C. Toso & Nicolas C. Buchs

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  1. A. Brönnimann
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  2. M. K. Jung
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  3. N. Niclauss
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  4. M. E. Hagen
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  5. C. Toso
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  6. Nicolas C. Buchs
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Contributions

Conception and design: Brönnimann and Buchs. Acquisition of data: Brönnimann and Niclauss. Analysis and interpretation of data: Brönnimann, Jung, Niclauss, Hagen, Toso, and Buchs. Drafting the article: Brönnimann and Buchs. Revising it critically for important intellectual content: Jung, Hagen, Toso, Buchs, and Niclauss. Final approval of the version to be published: Brönnimann, Jung, Niclauss, Hagen, Toso, and Buchs.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Nicolas C. Buchs.

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Conflict of Interest

A. Brönnimann, M. K. Jung, N. Niclauss, M. E. Hagen, C. Toso, N. C. Buchs have no conflict of interest. Monika E. Hagen received personal fees and non-financial support from Intuitive Surgical Inc., Quantgene Inc., Ethicon Inc., and Verb Surgical, outside this project.

Ethical Approval

All procedures performed in studies involving human participants were in accordance with the ethical standards of the institutional and/or national research committee and with the 1964 Helsinki declaration and its later amendments or comparable ethical standards.

Consent Statement

For this type of study (retrospective), formal consent is not required. However, all patients signed an informed consent form before undergoing bariatric surgery.

Open Access

This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made.

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Brönnimann, A., Jung, M.K., Niclauss, N. et al. The Impact of Pregnancy on Outcomes After Bariatric Surgery. OBES SURG 30, 3001–3009 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11695-020-04643-9

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