In Canada, severe obesity, measured as a body mass index or BMI ≥ 35 kg/m²) affects on average about 5% or over 1.2 million adults and is projected to increase to 6.4% by 2019. The rate of severe obesity is slightly higher in women (5.7%) compared to men (4.6%). [1] Significant and durable weight loss can be achieved with the use of bariatric surgery as a treatment for severe obesity. [2–4] It improves the health status and life expectancy of those affected. [5–7] The eligibility criteria for accessing bariatric surgery includes the following: 1. BMI ≥ 40 kg/m² or a BMI between 35 and 39.9 kg/m² with a comorbidity and 2. unsuccessful weight loss attempts [8]. North America studies indicate that women are more likely than men to access bariatric surgery [9, 10].

In Canada, the volume and provision of bariatric surgery has increased. In 2012/2013 almost 6000 procedures were performed compared to less than 1600 procedures in 2006–2007 and the number of hospitals performing bariatric procedures increased from 34 to 46 over the same time period [9]. There is a disconnect between the supply and demand of bariatric surgery resulting in long wait times for patients that average 5 years [11–15]. There are significant regional variations in the provision of surgical services in Canada and inequities in access to surgery based on geographical and socio-economic factors [13, 16, 17]. In Canada, the percentage of patients that meet eligibility criteria for bariatric surgery is estimated to be about 1% [18]. Consequently bariatric surgery is available to very few individuals who could potentially benefit from it. This is further heightened by the absence of any universally accepted and judicious approach to triaging patients for surgery [13, 14, 19]. Laparascopic sleeve gastrectomy (LSG) is the most frequently performed bariatric surgery option in Canada. In North America, the number of LSG’s increased by 244% between 2011 and 2013. Forty-three percent of all bariatric surgeries are now LSG’s [20].

One of the most important patient-reported reasons for wanting to undergo bariatric surgery is reduced quality of life. [21] Measures of well-being, functioning, and health under physical, social, and psychosocial domains comprise the concept Health-Related Quality of Life (HRQoL). [22, 23] It is important to examine HRQoL in pre-surgical patients in order to analyze changes after surgery and over time. A recent publication highlights the limited number of studies available for meta-analysis for a variety of reasons (e.g., selective reporting of HRQoL, use of non-validated tools and inconsistent reporting and presentation of results) [24].

Little is known in Canada [9, 18] or internationally [25] about the types of patients undergoing these procedures. Examining data on socio-demographics, sex distribution, pre-surgery BMI, comorbid profile and patient reported quality of life will help to inform healthcare providers, payers and health practitioners about the profile of patients that seek, are referred to and access bariatric surgery in Canada. This information is critical in order to: evaluate outcomes post-surgery; aggregate and compare data across centres; include data in national or international registries.

The current study objective is to investigate the morbidity and HRQoL of patients accessing LSG at a single-centre in one Canadian province. A second objective is to determine whether differences in HRQoL exist between male and female bariatric surgery candidates.

The current study is a cross-sectional analysis of the HRQoL of patients undergoing bariatric surgery at different time points in one centre in one province of Canada. Assessment of patients undergoing LSG takes place pre-surgery and post-surgery at 1, 3, 6, 12, 18, 24 months and annually thereafter. The provincial Health Research Ethics Authority (#11.101) approved the study and subjects provided written informed consent to take part.

Patients in this study averaged 44 years of age and had an average BMI of 49 kg/m². The majority of the sample were: women with post-secondary or some post-secondary education in full or part- time employment. Health status was significantly impaired pre-surgery with patients reporting on average 5.4 comorbidities. OSA affected two thirds (65%) of the study sample while half of the sample reported having been diagnosed with hypertension (47%), dyslipidemia (48%) and back pain (51%). Almost half of the study sample reported having osteoarthritis (44%), T2DM (42%), GERD (43%) and gallbladder disease (40%). Pre-operatively, women and men did not differ significantly on select socio-demographics variables (i.e., age, income, education or employment status, although there were differences in comorbid profiles. A high prevalence of OSA was diagnosed in both sexes (65%), and rates were one third higher for men. Men also reported higher rates of dyslipidemia, hypertension and gout. In contrast, women reported double the rate of gallbladder disease/gallstones.

Pre-surgery HRQoL was significantly impaired in the study sample. Few patients reported problems with self-care; however, between 44% and 67% of patients reported problems with anxiety/depression, mobility, usual activities and pain and discomfort. Patient perceptions of general health and physical health were impaired more than mental health.

According to the weight-specific IWQOL-Lite scale, patients reported impairment on all scales (most to least impairment): Self Esteem, Physical Function, Public Distress, Sexual Life and Work. Significant differences in HRQoL were reported by women and men on self esteem, sexual life and the IWQOL total score.

Women self-reported better General Health as evidenced by higher scores on the SF-12v2 (39.3 vs. 32.9) and the VAS (61.5 vs. 52.0) and better Physical Health (PCS 37.2 vs. 33.3). Although 10% of the total patient sample reported problems with self care on the EQ-5D-3L, women reported significantly fewer problems in this area than men (9.5% vs. 25.0%). Based on the IWQOL-Lite, women reported greater weight associated impairment than men on Self Esteem (27.3 vs. 44.1) and Sexual Life (49.2 vs. 63.6).

Our study population, the majority of whom were women, is similar to other patients seeking treatment for severe obesity [2, 18, 32–34]. Patients undergoing bariatric surgery are more often female with an average pre-surgery weight and BMI of 124.5kgs and 46 kg/m², respectively [2]. With respect to socio-demographics, our sample represents a high level of socio-economic status, with over 75% having some/full post-secondary education and half in higher income brackets. Findings on the relationship between socio-economic status and access to bariatric surgery are inconsistent, although in North America it appears that access to bariatric surgery has been reserved for those of higher social standing [18, 32, 35, 36]. This finding has been supported by publications that highlight inequities in access to bariatric surgery in Canada [13, 18]. Women and men had similar baseline characteristics, with the exception that women were less likely to be in partnered relationships, a finding similar to other studies [18, 32, 33, 37].

A very high level of obesity-related comorbidity was observed in the current study sample although the comorbid profile of patients seeking obesity treatment can vary signficantly by centre [18, 33, 38, 39]. In the Alberta population-based prospective evaluation of the quality of life outcomes and economic impact of bariatric surgery (APPLES) study, Padwal et al., assessed 150 bariatric surgical patients in Alberta, Canada. Compared to the current study, the APPLES authors reported higher rates of hypertension (61% vs. 47%) and dyslipidemia (60% vs. 48%) in their pre-surgery population, but similar rates of T2DM (42% vs. 44%) [38]. In contrast, compared to national Canadian data published on bariatric surgery recipients, obesity-related comorbidity was much higher in our study population with higher rates of hypertension (47% vs.13%), dyslipidemia (48% vs. 2.4%) and T2DM (42% vs. 21%) [18]. This variation may be partly explained by the fact that Newfoundland and Labrador has the highest rates of T2DM and CVD in Canada [40, 41]. Although, there may be potential under-coding of pre-existing conditions in administrative datasets when compared to prospectively collected data [18]. High levels of comorbidity may be one factor that motivates patients to seek treatment for severe obesity. [39, 42] In previous research conducted at our centre, individuals seeking treatment for severe obesity reported health concerns as the primary reason for wanting to lose weight, similar to other studies [21]. In the current study, the prevalence of comorbid conditions differed between women and men seeking treatment (e.g., OSA, dyslipidemia, hypertension, gout, and gallbladder disease/gallstones) similar to a study of over 200 patients undergoing bariatric surgery conducted in Germany from the University Hospital Heidelberg. In this study the authors examined patient expectations of surgery and collected data on baseline comorbidity. A similar prevalence of hypertension was reported with men more likely than women to be affected. Although much lower prevalences of OSA and dyslipidemia were reported, men were twice as likely to report being affected than women. [39] Gender differences in the rates of OSA and risk factors for CVD are often reported, but differences in the rates of other conditions are more inconsistent [33, 39, 43, 44].

Consistent with the results of other published studies, individuals seeking obesity treatment in the current study, demonstrated significantly impaired HRQoL compared to: the general population, individuals with overweight/obesity, or those with severe obesity not seeking surgical treatment. [23, 45–47] Studies consistently demonstrate that in individuals seeking treatment for severe obesity, physical health is impacted more than mental health [5, 32, 46, 48], although the magnitude of the impact varies. In the current study, the PCS of 36.4 is lower than the PCS of 41.5 reported by Warkentin et al., in the Canadian APPLES study [49] although the MCS score of 47.8 is more comparable to the APPLES results of 46.9. Compared to the Utah Obesity Study [50], a prospective cohort study of over 400 patients accessing Roux-en-Y Gastric Bypass (RYGB), the current study’s pre-surgery HRQoL scores are higher than those reported by the authors (PCS 31.4, MCS 41.4). In a study on pre-surgical patients conducted in Germany, the authors reported a similar PCS to the current study (34.3 versus 36.4), although the MCS was lower (42.1 versus 47.8). In both these studies the direction of the impairment remained similar in that physicial health was impacted more than mental health. [48] The EQ index of 0.78 reported in the current study is similar to that reported by the APPLES Study authors (0.79), and significantly lower than population norms (0.82). Surgical patients in the current study reported overall health (VAS 59.8) that was slightly lower than the APPLES study authors (VAS 63.6) and significantly lower than population norms (VAS 78.8) [49, 51].

Similar to other studies, patients seeking surgical treatment for severe obesity report significantly impaired weight-related HRQoL, although the level of impairment varies [23, 46, 50]. In the current study, the total IWQOL-Lite score (0–100), was 43.2, which was lower than scores reported by Padwal et al., in the APPLES study (IWQOL-Lite: 49.9) [47] or Belle et al., in the US Longitudinal Assessment of Bariatric Surgery (LABS), (IWQOL-Lite 46.8) [52] but higher than that reported by the Utah Obesity Study (IWQOL-Lite 41.8) [50]. These total scores are well below those reported by the general population (IWQOL-Lite 94.7) and lower than those reported by individuals living with severe obesity not seeking surgical treatment (IWQOL-Lite 54.9) [52]. Similar to other studies using North American data, in the current study, the domains most impacted by weight in decreasing order of impact were self-esteem, physical health, public distress, sexual life and work [37, 52], but are in contrast to data from Europe where patients report that weight impairs physical function more than self-esteem. [37, 46] It is an interesting finding that work life was reported as least impaired by weight in the current study and in other published studies [37, 52] as research suggests that absenteeism from work and more importantly presenteeism are much higher in individuals living with severe obesity compared to other BMI categories [53]. This is an area that could warrant further exploration.

Our study results demonstrate that similar to other programs in North America and elsewhere, patients living with severe obesity who access bariatric surgery tend to be women with high socio-economic status. Individuals seeking treatment report significant morbidity and impaired HRQoL. Women and men presented with substantial but significantly different pre-operative comorbid profiles. HRQoL was significantly impaired in men and women. Women compared to men reported better scores in general and physical health and fewer problems with self-care. However, weight impaired women’s sexual life and self-esteem significantly more than men.