Five-Year Outcomes of Bariatric Surgery vs. Conservative Weight Management in People with HIV: A Single-Center...

Individuals with human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) infection now have life expectancies similar to non-infected people but face increased obesity prevalence. The long-term effects of bariatric surgery (BS) and conservative weight therapy (CWT) in patients living with HIV (PLWH) remain unexplored.

A retrospective review (2012-2018) at a Tertiary Centre for Bariatric Surgery and National Centre for HIV care examined the outcomes of BS and CWT. Parameters evaluated included weight loss and HIV metrics such as viral load and CD4 count.

The study included 24 chronic HIV patients, with 10 undergoing BS (5 laparoscopic adjustable gastric banding (LAGB), 3 laparoscopic sleeve gastrectomy (LSG), 2 Roux-en-Y gastric bypass (LRYGB) and 14 in CWT. The BS group showed significant BMI reduction (- 7.07, - 6.55, - 7.81 kg/m² at 1, 3, and 5 years). The CWT group's BMI reduction was non-significant. The BS group's %TWL was 16%, 17.8%, and 15% at 1, 3, and 5 years, respectively; however, stapled procedures were more effective, at 1 year, %TWL was 17% LSG and 25% RYGB, at 3 years, 23% LSG, 30% RYGB and at 5 years 21% with LSG and 28% with RYGB. HIV outcomes remained stable with undetectable viral loads in the BS group.

BS appears to be a safe and effective medium-term treatment for obesity in PLWH, providing significant weight loss whilst maintaining the efficacy of HIV treatments. Although CWT has shown modest benefits, the outcomes from BS indicate that it could be a preferable option for managing obesity in PLWH based on this limited dataset.