PHILADELPHIA — Obese patients who undergo bariatric bypass surgery lose more lean muscle mass early in recovery compared with gastric banding patients, but an intense exercise program can mitigate the muscle loss, researchers found.
At 1 year post operation, the bypass surgery patients lost a mean of 19.62 lbs. of lean body mass compared with 12.41 lbs. in the laparoscopic adjustable gastric banding group, according to Ted Okerson, MD, from the University of California at Irvine, and Helmuth Billy, MD, from Ventura Advance Surgical Associates in Los Angeles.