Cancer Risk Reduced By 80% After Bariatric Surgery - Largest Reductions Seen In Breast Cancer And Colon Cancer

MONTRÉAL, QC and WASHINGTON, DC -- A new study of nearly 6,800 morbidly obese patients shows that those who had bariatric surgery reduced the risk of developing cancer by about 80 percent, with breast cancer and colon cancer showing the greatest reductions. The study was presented today here at the 25th Annual Meeting of the American Society for Metabolic & Bariatric Surgery (ASMBS). Researchers from McGill University in Montreal, Quebec, Canada compared 1,035 patients who had bariatric surgery between 1986 and 2002 with 5,746 patients who did not have surgery, matching them by age, gender, and duration of morbid obesity diagnosis. None of the patients in either group had previously been diagnosed with cancer. A tota...