Complication And Death Rate No Better At Bariatric Surgery Centers Of Excellence Than At Other Hospitals

Amazing how a simple marketing ploy does not improve the product.

"Patients who undergo bariatric surgery at hospitals designated as centers of excellence do not appear to have lower mortality rates or lower rates of complications than those whose procedures are performed at other hospitals, according to a report in the April issue of Archives of Surgery, one of the JAMA/Archives journals.

Center of excellence designation is awarded to bariatric surgery centers by the American College of Surgeons or the American Society for Metabolic and Bariatric Surgery, according to background information in the article. The nearly identical guidelines require that centers perform at least 125 operations per year; employ a bariatric surgery coordinator and personnel to follow up patients long-term; and enter outcomes into proprietary databases, which requires trained staff and a subscription to a database. 'These criteria make intuitive sense but lack an evidence base for their application,' the author writes. In 2006, the Centers for Medicaid and Medicare Services began requiring that patients they insure undergo bariatric surgery at designated centers of excellence."

The BSCOE designation is conferred by the Surgical Review Corporation, which is related to the ASMBS.

It, IMHO, lies:

"Surgery is the only effective therapy for morbid obesity and its complications."

Bull.

Weight loss "is the only effective therapy for morbid obesity."

How you do it matters not.

Except to the pockets of the IMHO malpractitioners of bariatric, i.e., fat-person, surgery.

Here is what it costs to buy a "Center of Excellence" designation.

Not bad money, if you can get it.

Especially without assuring that your designated centers are any better than the competition.