Bariatric Surgery's Role in Treating Obesity and Related Conditions

Author: University of Gothenburg
Published: 2014/04/23 - Updated: 2025/04/06
Publication Details: Peer-Reviewed, Research, Study, Analysis
Category Topic: Medical Research News - Academic Publications

Page Content: Synopsis - Introduction - Main - Insights, Updates

Synopsis: This article highlights a groundbreaking study on bariatric surgery, showing that the benefits of weight loss surgeries extend beyond just reducing stomach size to potentially improving metabolic conditions like diabetes and heart disease. Researchers discovered that increased bile acids, rather than the surgery itself, are responsible for the positive effects, suggesting new therapeutic possibilities. This information could be of significant interest to people with obesity, diabetes, and heart disease, particularly those who are seeking alternative treatments without undergoing surgery - Disabled World (DW).

Introduction

Researchers at the Sahlgrenska Academy and University of Cincinnati have shown that the health benefits are not caused by a reduction in the stomach size but by increased levels of bile acids in the blood. These findings, reported in Nature, indicate that bile acids could be a new target for treating obesity and diabetes.

Main Content

Previous research from the Sahlgrenska Academy has demonstrated that obesity surgery is the only effective treatment for obesity and obesity-related diabetes.

However, the mechanisms that cause the positive effects have been unclear.

Positive effects caused by bile acids:

Professor Fredrik Backhed, in collaboration with Randy Seeley and coworkers from the University of Cincinnati in the US, has shown that the positive effects of bariatric surgery are likely caused by the surgery-induced increase in bile acids. The study, which is published online in the leading science journal Nature, focuses on a specific receptor called FXR, which is involved in bile acid signaling.

"Our study shows that signaling through FXR is essential for the beneficial effects of the surgery to be achieved. This is a major breakthrough in understanding how bariatric surgery affects metabolism and in the development of new treatment strategies", says Fredrik Backhed.

Important future complement:

The prevalence of obesity is increasing worldwide and it is not realistic to operate on all obese subjects. Furthermore, bariatric surgery is associated with a risk of complications. Treatment strategies based on the FXR receptor could therefore be an important future therapeutic approach.

Improves glucose metabolism:

In this study, mice with or without the FXR gene underwent an operation termed vertical sleeve gastrectomy (VSG) in which approximately 80 percent of the stomach was removed. The surgical procedure is the same as that performed in humans.

The researchers observed that the operation promoted weight loss and improved glucose metabolism in mice with FXR while the operation had no effect in mice that lacked FXR.

Alters intestinal bacterial flora:

This study also showed that VSG resulted in changes in the gut microbiota, a potentially important finding given that Fredrik Backhed's research group has previously demonstrated that the intestinal bacterial flora is altered in obesity and diabetes.

These additional findings suggest that an altered gut flora together with signaling through FXR may contribute to improved metabolism. This means that future treatments based on the intestinal flora could help in the treatment of diabetes.

The article FXR is a molecular target for the effects of vertical sleeve gastrectomy was published online in Nature on 26 March.

Insights, Analysis, and Developments

Attribution/Source(s): This peer reviewed publication was selected for publishing by the editors of Disabled World (DW) due to its relevance to the disability community. Originally authored by University of Gothenburg and published on 2014/04/23, this content may have been edited for style, clarity, or brevity.