Allied health articleEvaluation of expectations and knowledge in bariatric surgery patients
Section snippets
Participants
Demographic information, body mass index (BMI), and University of Virginia Bariatric Knowledge Scale (UVA-BKS) scores from 334 preoperative bariatric surgery patients were extracted from the Bariatric Interdisciplinary Psychology and Surgery System (BIPASS) database, which consists of data on patients presenting for gastric bypass surgery (see “Procedure” below). Patients were included only if they had an entry for “weight loss expectations” that had been obtained during the clinical interview.
Patient weight loss expectations
The results of the frequency analyses indicated that 65% of the sample (n = 217) overestimated their weight loss expectations; thus, 65% of patients indicated an expected weight loss of >70% of excess body weight. A small portion (9.9%, n = 33) of patients underestimated the degree of expected weight loss, and only one-quarter of the sample (25.1%, n = 84) reported accurate weight loss expectations. The mean %EBWL was 78.4% ± 19.43%, indicating that most patients’ expected weight loss slightly
Discussion
Although these patients had an adequate understanding of the nutritional and medical components of gastric bypass surgery, some presented with significant misconceptions about the expected weight loss and the need for continued diet and exercise. Almost one third of patients did not view surgery as a tool for diet and exercise, but indicated that it mostly prevented overeating. Although bariatric surgery undoubtedly affects the quantity of food one can consume in 1 sitting, this response
Conclusion
The psychosocial evaluation is now the standard of care for bariatric patients. At present, most of its focus is placed on identifying psychiatric contraindications to postoperative success. However, nonpsychiatric factors, such as knowledge about the medical, nutritional, and psychosocial aspects of the surgery, as well as patients’ expectations about weight loss, are also an important aspect of the psychosocial evaluation. Our data demonstrated that patients present with misconceptions about
Disclosure
The authors have no commercial associations that might be a conflict of interest in relation to this article.
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