Psychiatric Medication Use and Weight Outcomes One Year After Bariatric Surgery

Given the high rates of psychiatric comorbidity in bariatric surgery patients, pharmacotherapy is common and could potentially influence weight loss outcomes.

We aimed to identify the impact of psychotropic medication use on percent total weight loss (%TWL) 1 year after bariatric surgery.

In this prospective cohort study, 190 patients were compared based on demographic variables (age, sex, relationship status, employment status), body mass index, %TWL, and psychotropic medication use before and 1 year after bariatric surgery. An analysis of variance test was used as a global test of significance for psychotropic medication comparisons related to %TWL. Significance of post hoc comparisons was calculated with the Tukey's Honestly Significance Difference test.

Sixty-one of 190 (32.1%) patients were taking psychiatric medications before surgery; of those, 82% (50/61) continued to take psychiatric medications 1-year after surgery. %TWL did not significantly differ between patients taking no psychiatric medications, one medication, or more than one medication 1 year after surgery (31.4% vs. 29.9% vs. 34.4%, respectively). Among patients taking antidepressants, those taking serotonin-norepinephrine reuptake inhibitors had a significantly higher %TWL than those taking selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (36.4% vs. 27.8%; P = 0.032).

This longitudinal study suggests that psychiatric medication use was not associated with poorer %TWL at 1 year after bariatric surgery. Within class, antidepressant use may have differential effects on weight loss after bariatric surgery and warrants further investigation.