Twice As Likely To Get Divorced: Could Bariatric Surgery Ruin Your Relationship?



Compared to the general U.S. population, adults who have had weight-loss surgery are more than twice as likely to get married within five years. An adult who has bariatric surgery while married is more than twice as likely to get divorced, according to a recent study led by epidemiologists at the University of Pittsburgh School of Public Health.

The study, which was released in the Annals of Surgery Open from Wolters Kluwer, is the first to describe the marital outcomes of American adults who underwent weight-loss surgery. It offers patients and healthcare professionals hard evidence on how romantic relationships change as a result of the procedure.

According to lead author Wendy King, Ph.D., associate professor of epidemiology at Pitt Public Health, "Weight loss is generally the goal of bariatric surgery, but people have a variety of motivators for wanting to lose weight - for example, remission of Type 2 diabetes and improvement in joint pain." The desire for a romantic connection or bettering relationships has also been cited by patients as a major incentive. Prior to this study, there was no quantifiable information available in the United States on how bariatric surgery affects patients' chances of getting married, divorcing, or finding romantic stability.

The two most popular and successful surgical treatments for severe obesity, Roux-en-Y gastric bypass and sleeve gastrectomy, were performed on 1,441 U.S. patients between 2006 and 2009. King and her colleagues examined the data on these patients. Ages of the participants ranged from 19 to 75, and 79% of them were female. At the time of operation, 62% of patients were married or cohabitating; the remaining patients were either always single, separated, divorced, or widowed.

The patients were a part of the Longitudinal Assessment of Bariatric Surgery-2 (LABS-2) project, a prospective cohort study funded by the National Institutes of Health of people having weight-loss surgery in the United States.

In line with other Scandinavian studies, the majority of LABS-2 patients retained their marital status for five years after surgery, with 81% of married participants continuing to be such, and 70% of those who had been single their entire lives continuing to be so. However, 8% of married participants divorced, compared to 4% of the overall population, while 18% of participants who were not married got married. 5% more of married people who didn't get divorced split.

According to King, a variety of variables increased the possibility that a participant would change their relationship status following surgery. Several were foreseen: Prior to surgery, those who were younger and shared a home with a spouse had higher marriage rates over the next five years. Some, however, were more unexpected. For instance, while increased physical health was connected with marriage, the quantity of weight lost was not.

But in terms of separation and divorce, those who lost more weight and those who reported an increase in sexual desire after surgery were more likely to do so.

This could mean that a patient's altered lifestyle following surgery caused them to fall out of sync with their spouse, according to King. When one partner improves their diet, increases their physical activity, and wants more sex but the other doesn't, it can be very difficult. A marriage may experience substantial difficulty as a result. It can be crucial for couples to take this into account and prepare for post-operative relationship maintenance plans.

The team was unable to tell if people who got married or divorced went into surgery looking for a change, King observed, because the LABS-2 trial did not ask participants if they wanted to change their romantic relationship status was one of their reasons for obtaining bariatric surgery.

According to research, "our connections with others, especially those with lifelong partners, have a profound impact on our health, both physical and mental," stated King. In order for doctors to provide the best advice to their patients and manage expectations before and after surgery, it will be crucial for future studies to disentangle the directionality of the numerous relationships between bariatric surgery and relationship status that we discovered in this study.

This study received no extra funding, although LABS-2 was supported by a cooperation agreement with the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases.

By UNIVERSITY OF PITTSBURGH 

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