Predicting Postoperative Mortality in Gastric Bypass Surgery

One deterrent to gastric bypass surgery is the relatively high incidence of perioperative complications — some life-threatening — in this patient population. Earlier this year, researchers described an “obesity surgery mortality risk score,” developed at a single institution with 2075 patients (Surg Obes Relat Dis 2007; 3:134). Now, the researchers have validated their scoring system using gastric bypass surgery databases at four other institutions (involving about 1000 patients at each center). Open and laparoscopic procedures were considered together.

The scoring system assigns one point to each of five preoperative factors: body-mass index ≥50 kg/m², male sex, hypertension, risk factors for pulmonary embolism (including previous thromboem…