Do you Know Weight Loss from “Bariatric Surgery” Reverses Premature Ageing?

According to the National Family Health Survey, the incidence of Diabetes and Hypertension is increasing in India thereby increasing the proportion of obese or overweight people.

Obesity has achieved epidemic proportions across the world. In the developed countries, 2/3rd of the population is obese and almost 1/3rd is morbidly obese.

What can Obesity do to you?

• Being obese cuts your lifespan by 10 years.
• Risk of premature death grows steadily and steeply
• Expanding waistline can increase your risk of coronary heart disease, stroke, respiratory disease and cancer

*A study published in the Lancent Medical Journal found that overweight people lost about a year of life expectancy, moderately obese lost about 3 years and severely obese people lost about 10 years of life expectancy depending on the Body Mass Index*.

Benefits of Bariatric Surgery

Dr. Nikhil Agnihotri, Senior Consultant, Max Super Specialty Hospital, Shalimar Bagh, says that there is a significant decrease in the premature ageing markers in the blood samples that are taken before or one/two years after the Bariatric Surgery. Weight loss is accompanied by a decrease in pro-inflammatory cytokines such as plasminogen activator inhibitor-1 and interleukin -6 and increase in the anti-inflammatory cytokine, interleukin-10.

The cell division and breaking of cells due to oxidative stress shorten the telomeres that are an internal clock of each cell. When telomeres get very short, the cell can no longer divide and is replenished or stays in the body as an aged cell. Two years after bariatric surgery patients were found to have telomeres that were 80% longer than they had been before the procedure.

Bariatric Surgery, thus helps in losing excess weight, provides sustenance of weight loss, in the long run, leads to complete or partial resolution of co-morbidities and prevents their complications.