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Page: << Prev | 1 | 2 A year later, after weight loss, the heart muscles of the obese people were less overgrown and the hearts could also hold more blood. Thickening of the aorta, the main heart artery, was also greatly reduced after weight loss.
"These findings provide a potential mechanism for the reduction in mortality seen with weight loss," the researchers wrote.
And it thus helps explain something of a medical mystery -- why people who are grossly overweight are more at risk of heart attack and sudden death than their numbers show, said Dr. Christine Ren, a bariatric surgeon who is an associate professor of surgery at New York University Langone Medical Center.
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"Most of them say they are pretty healthy, maybe with a slight elevation of blood pressure, but when you really drill down to it you can show an abnormal cardiac function," Ren said. "The point is that their heart is not normal and that already is having a negative effect on their health."
Losing weight by dieting is desirable, "but the problem with diets is that statistics show maintenance of weight loss by diet is extremely difficult and quite rare," Ren said.
Bariatric surgery is expensive, costing anywhere from $15,000 to $25,000, she said, and it is not perfect. "There is always going to be 5 percent of these people who gain most of their weight back, but it still is the best chance of having significant weight loss," Ren said.
However, health insurance coverage of bariatric surgery is uncertain, varying from company to company and state to state, she said, and many plans are starting to put more limits on coverage.
More information
Bariatric surgery is described by the U.S. National Library of Medicine. Page: << Prev | 1 | 2
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