Weight-loss surgery cuts the risk of developing cancer by 37%
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To achieve this cancer protection, people must lose at least 20% of their body weight, which is well beyond the ability of those seeking to lose weight by diet and exercise, according to senior researcher Dr. Ali Aminian, director of the Cleveland Clinic's Bariatric and Metabolic Institute.
Three new studies show that losing a large amount of weight through weight-loss surgery can considerably reduce your chance of developing or dying from cancer. According to a study presented Tuesday at the American Society for Metabolic and Bariatric Surgery's (ASMBS) annual meeting in Dallas, obese people who had bariatric surgery were at least two times less likely to develop certain types of cancer and more than three times less likely to die of cancer than obese people who didn't have the procedure.
According to results published June 3 in the Journal of the American Medical Association, another much larger trial by the Cleveland Clinic revealed similar, if smaller, benefits from weight-loss surgery: a 32 percent lower risk of acquiring cancer and a 48 percent lower risk of cancer-related death.
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Weight reduction has a dose-dependent association with cancer risk, according to the findings: the more weight you lose, the lower your cancer risk.Another study presented at the ASMBS summit on Tuesday discovered that bariatric surgery lowered the risk of colon cancer by 37%.
To achieve this cancer protection, people must lose at least 20% of their body weight, which is well beyond the ability of those seeking to lose weight by diet and exercise, according to senior researcher Dr. Ali Aminian, director of the Cleveland Clinic's Bariatric and Metabolic Institute.
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More than 42 percent of Americans are obese, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.Their extra weight raises their risk of acquiring 13 malignancies, which account for two out of every five cancers diagnosed in the United States each year.
Given the global obesity epidemic, obesity is predicted to overtake smoking as the leading cause of cancer in the near future, according to Aminian.
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According to a report presented at the ASMBS meeting, the first study compared more than 2,100 bariatric surgery patients against more than 5,500 obese adults who qualified for the treatment but did not have it.
According to the researchers, breast cancer (1.4 percent vs. 2.7 percent), gynecologic cancer (0.4 percent vs. 2.6 percent), kidney cancer (0.10 percent vs. 0.80 percent), brain cancer (0.20 percent vs. 0.90 percent), lung cancer (0.20 percent vs. 0.60 percent), and thyroid cancer (0.10 percent vs. 0.70 percent) were all significantly reduced by weight-loss surgery.
The weight-loss surgery group also had a reduced incidence of any new malignancy (approximately 5.2 percent vs. slightly over 12 percent) and a greater survival rate over a decade (93 percent vs. 79 percent).
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