A meta-analysis conducted by Chinese researchers found that bariatric surgery improved the cardiac structures and functions in obese people. The study results were published in the journal Obesity Surgery.
Obesity is a disorder that is associated with cardiac dysfunction, atherosclerosis, and increased cardiovascular risk. It can negatively impact the quality of life. Cardiomyopathy and severe heart failure are some of the consequences of obesity, which in turn raise morbidity and mortality. The metabolic and weight loss effects of bariatric surgery on improving cardiac structure and function in obese patients could be supported by clinical evidence. As there is a lot of literature on the effects of bariatric surgery in obese patients, Shanya Huang and other researchers from National Clinical Research Center for Metabolic Diseases, China conducted a meta-analysis to investigate how cardiac structures and functions change in the very early stage after bariatric surgery.
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From databases like PubMed, Embase, Cochrane Library, and Web of Science articles including patients who underwent bariatric surgery and examined the changes of their cardiac indices were included. Review Manager 5.1 and Stata 12.0 were used to pool the results. Weighted mean differences (WMDs) with 95% confidence intervals (CIs) were obtained. The heterogeneity between studies was determined by the I-squared (I2) test. Funnel plots and Egger's test were utilized to identify publication bias. Sensitivity analysis was conducted using the leave-one-out method.
Findings obtained:
24 research articles having 942 patients were considered for this meta-analysis.
Within 3-6 months of the bariatric surgery, most cardiac indices changed.
The following indices improved:
Improvement in cardiac geometry
reflected by a reduction in left ventricular mass
WMD = − 22.06,
95% CI = (− 27.97, − 16.16)
Improvement in left ventricular diastolic function
reflected by the decrease in the E/e' ratio
WMD = − 0.90
95% CI = (− 1.83, − 0.16)
Left ventricular ejection fraction (not much change)

WMD = 0.94
95% CI = (− 0.19, 2.07)
left ventricular systolic function
left ventricular longitudinal strain
WMD = − 2.43
95% CI = (− 3.96, − 0.89)
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Thus, by including the newest and most comprehensive cardiac indices this was the first study to prove that cardiac structures and functions are improved early after bariatric surgery.
Further reading: Huang, S., Lan, Y., Zhang, C. et al. The Early Effects of Bariatric Surgery on Cardiac Structure and Function: a Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis. OBES SURG (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11695-022-06366-5