A BRC-supported researchers’ recommendations that weight loss surgery should be offered to thousands more people in order to tackle an epidemic of type 2 diabetes have been adopted by the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE).
Dr Rachel Batterham, Head of Obesity and Bariatric Surgery at UCLH, said doctors should consider offering surgery for younger patients because of evidence that early interventions were the most successful in reversing diabetes.
Dr Batterham, who was one of the 12 members of the NICE obesity guideline development group, said: “We now know that the health benefits of bariatric surgery for people with type 2 diabetes is so great that it really needs to be considered as part of their treatment pathway. We also know that the earlier you have the surgery in your diabetes course, then the more likely you are to have remission or a really good improvement.”
At present weight loss surgery is given to patients on the NHS with a body mass index score of over 40 or to those with a BMI over 35 if they have another condition, such as type 2 diabetes, and have tried to lose weight.
Now NICE, which advises the NHS in England, has updated their weight loss surgery criteria for people with type 2 diabetes to rule that anyone with a BMI of 30 – the threshold between overweight and obese – should be considered for the surgery if they have been diagnosed with diabetes in the last decade.
In recent years Dr Batterham and her team at UCLH have treated increasing numbers of cases of overweight patients with type 2 diabetes in their 20s and 30s. Dr Batterham said there is “no age cut-off” for surgery, except that children need to have reached puberty.
Dr Batterham said: “It could benefit a young patient, it could benefit a person of 70, and mean they live the rest of their life in much better health.”
Latest figures show that between 2011-2013, 570 men and women under the age of 24 - including 62 people under the age of 18 – underwent obesity operations. In total, around 7,500 weight loss procedures are carried out in England each year, including 4,000 on those with diabetes. The authors of the NICE guidance said they would like to see that number reach around 15,000.
This month it was announced Dr Batterham will deliver the Rank Nutrition Lecture at the Diabetes UK Professional Conference in March 2015, which is specifically focused on nutrition.
Last month Dr Batterham received the Lilly Scientific Achievement Award by the Obesity Society. To read more about her research into how an ‘obesity gene’ triggers weight gain click here.
To read the Obesity: identification, assessment and management of overweight and obesity in children, young people and adults NICE guidance in full click here.
