An International Diabetes Federation (IDF) paper calls for bariatric surgery to be considered earlier in the treatment of eligible type 2 diabetes patients, to help stem the serious complications that can result from diabetes. The position paper was presented to leading experts at the 2nd World Congress on Interventional Therapies for Type 2 Diabetes in New York on 28 March.
The statement was written by experts in diabetes and bariatric surgery and contains a series of recommendations on the use of weight loss surgery as a cost effective treatment option for severely obese people with type 2 diabetes.
The combination of obesity and type 2 diabetes is looming as the biggest epidemic and public health issue in human history. Type 2 diabetes is one of the fastest growing diseases today with close to 300 million people affected worldwide and 450 million people forecast to have diabetes by 2030.
The statement highlights that there is increasing evidence that the health of obese people with type 2 diabetes, including their glucose control and other obesity related comorbidities (conditions), can benefit substantially from bariatric surgery under certain circumstances.
