Faculty Collaboration Database

Bariatric surgery in patients with advanced heart failure: A proposed multi-disciplinary pathway for surgical care in medically complex patients. Surgery 2021 Sep;170(3):659-663

Date

05/31/2021

Pubmed ID

34052027

DOI

10.1016/j.surg.2021.04.036

Scopus ID

2-s2.0-85106595666 (requires institutional sign-in at Scopus site)   5 Citations

Abstract

BACKGROUND: The objective of this study was to develop a multi-disciplinary care pathway to minimize perioperative complications in patients with advanced heart failure undergoing bariatric surgery. Patients with severe obesity and heart failure carry increased perioperative surgical risk compared to patients with no heart failure due to the severity of their cardiac disease state and associated comorbidities. Our bariatric program routinely excluded patients with advanced heart failure from undergoing bariatric surgery due to the high reported perioperative risk. However, knowing the potential beneficial impact of bariatric surgery for advanced heart failure, our program hoped that the thoughtful development of a perioperative pathway before inclusion of patients with advanced heart failure in the bariatric surgery program could minimize the morbidity of these high-risk patients in comparison to prior publications in the literature.

METHODS: Two multi-disciplinary care pathways were developed, including advanced heart failure, anticoagulation specialists, and transplant cardiologists, to optimize bariatric care for severely obese patients with advanced heart failure with or without mechanical circulatory support and implementation was evaluated for short-term 30-day complications and 6 month cardiac and weight-loss outcomes.

RESULTS: Two multi-disciplinary care pathways were developed and implemented on 5 patients with heart failure with reduced ejection fraction (pathway 1) and 3 patients requiring mechanical circulatory support (pathway 2). There were no in-hospital complications or mortality following either pathway, and there was only 1 emergency room visit and 1 re-admission. The average length of stay for patients with heart failure with reduced ejection fraction without mechanical circulatory support was 2.4 days and for heart failure with reduced ejection fraction with mechanical circulatory support was 4.3 days. Three patients met body mass index criteria for transplant listing at 6 months. Ejection fraction increased an average of 9% at 6 months postoperatively for patients with heart failure with reduced ejection fraction not requiring mechanical circulatory support.

CONCLUSION: With multi-disciplinary care pathway development designed to maximize safety by intensely supporting preoperative cardiac optimization and medication titration postoperatively, bariatric surgery can be performed in patients with advanced heart failure with or without mechanical circulatory support, allowing patients the opportunity for weight loss as a bridge to transplant or potentially meaningful cardiac recovery.

Author List

Kindel TL, Higgins RM, Lak K, Gould J, Baumann Kreuziger L, Mohammed A, Gaglianello N, Ishizawar D

Authors

Lisa M. Baumann Kreuziger MD Professor in the Medicine department at Medical College of Wisconsin
Nunzio A. Gaglianello MD Associate Professor in the Medicine department at Medical College of Wisconsin
Jon Gould MD Chief, Professor in the Surgery department at Medical College of Wisconsin
Rana Higgins MD Associate Professor in the Surgery department at Medical College of Wisconsin
Tammy Lyn Kindel MD, PhD Associate Professor in the Surgery department at Medical College of Wisconsin
Kathleen L. Lak MD Associate Professor in the Surgery department at Medical College of Wisconsin

MESH terms used to index this publication - Major topics in bold

Adult
Bariatric Surgery
Body Mass Index
Comorbidity
Delivery of Health Care
Female
Heart Failure
Humans
Incidence
Interdisciplinary Communication
Male
Middle Aged
Obesity, Morbid
Postoperative Complications
Retrospective Studies
Wisconsin
Young Adult