Blood Pressure Drops Along With Weight

A new study finds that severely obese patients may experience significant, long-term improvements in blood pressure after gastric bypass surgery.

Researchers at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center (UPMC, Pennsylvania, USA) Weight Management Center analyzed data from 347 obese patients, with an initial body mass index (BMI) greater than 40, who underwent gastric bypass surgery at UPMC between 1992 and 2001. Half of the study patients were diagnosed as hypertensive prior to surgery, but only some of them were being treated for their hypertension. At the time of data analysis, 18 months after surgery, their BMIs had stabilized to about 35, still categorized as obese.

The patients who were not being treated for hypertension prior to surgery experienced significant blood pressure decreases that continued to remain low 18 months after surgery. Of the patients under active drug treatment for hypertension prior to surgery, about one-third were able to reduce or eliminate their blood pressure medications after surgery. The group of patients with normal blood pressure showed insignificant changes following surgery. The results were published in the March 2006 issue of the Archives of Surgery.

"For those severely overweight patients with elevated blood pressure, or under treatment for elevated blood pressure, bariatric surgery offers the promise of improved health, with not only substantial and sustained weight loss, but also the added benefit of significant blood pressure improvements,” said study co-author Anita Courcoulas, M.D., associate professor of surgery at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine, and director of the minimally invasive bariatric and general surgery program at UPMC.




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UPMC Weight Management Center