Both gastric bypass and sleeve gastrectomy have similar rates of complications and death: JAMA

"Prior research had found that sleeve gastrectomy and gastric bypass resulted in significant weight loss and low complication rates in adolescents with severe obesity," said Ryan Howard, M.D., a general surgery resident at University of Michigan Health. "But the comparative outcomes of these two procedures, which might help inform health insurance policy and decision-making, had yet to be explored for adolescents insured by Medicaid."

The researchers identified just over 1,110 patients who had undergone one of the two weight-loss surgeries between 2012 and 2018, a relatively small number compared to the more than 95,000 patients covered by Medicare who had either gastric bypass or a sleeve gastrectomy in the same time period.

Howard says the disparity could be due to access issues or concerns about bariatric surgery as a weight-loss treatment for youth.

Reference:

Howard R, Yang J, Thumma J, et al. Health Care Use and Adverse Events After Sleeve Gastrectomy and Gastric Bypass Among Adolescents With Severe Obesity Insured by Medicaid. JAMA. 2022;328(19):1972–1974. doi:10.1001/jama.2022.14843