Study: Gastric Band Effective In Teen Weight Loss

February 10, 2010 6:30 a.m. EST

Melbourne, Australia (AHN) - A study by Australian researchers touts the effectiveness of gastric banding for obese teens for weight loss over intensive lifestyle management programs.

Monash University scientists said in a statement that teens who received the procedure lost more than 50 percent excess weight and experienced greater benefits to health and quality of life than those opting for lifestyle changes alone.

Teenage obesity is growing problem in the United States, with more than 17.4 percent of adolescents being overweight, compared with 14.8 percent in 2000, the researchers said.

For their study, the researchers conducted a randomized controlled trial that included 50 adolescents between 14 and 18 years old. The participants had high body weight indexes and were assigned to either participate in a supervised lifestyle intervention program or to get the gastric band.

In a follow-up two years later, 24 of the 25 patients who received the gastric band and 18 of the 25 participants who followed the lifestyle changes completed the trial.

The researchers said that the 21 of the 25 gastric band participants had a primary outcome of more than 50 percent of excess weight loss. This is compared to three of the 25 participants who tried lifestyle changes to lose the weight.

The study is published in the Feb. 10 issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association.