Association of Components of Metabolic Syndrome with Depression and Anxiety in Patients Undergoing Weight Reduction Surgery

ABSTRACT

Background: Obesity can be associated with psychiatric disorders such as depression. Aim: To determine the prevalence and association of psychiatric disorders in patients with excess body weight. Methods: Patients scheduled for weight reduction surgery were included. For each patient, pre-surgical clinical and psychiatric data were collected. Follow-up data were available 1-year after surgery. Patients with psychiatric disorders were compared to those without psychiatric disorders. Mann-Whitney non-parametric test was used for comparison of numerical parameters, while prevalence of certain clinical and demographic events were validated using chi-square homogeneity test. Results: 499 patients were included: age: 42.8 ±11.0 years, 20% male, 76% Caucasians, BMI 46.8 ± 10.8, ALT 32.5 ± 21.7 and AST 25.0 ± 14.3. At baseline, a history of psychiatric disorder was documented in 214 (43%) patients (depression in 35% of patients, anxiety in 6% and other psychiatric diagnosis in 2.2%). Patients with a history of depression were older (p=0.0021), more likely to report a history of drinking alcohol either at baseline (p=0.0434) or 1-year after surgery (p= 0.0302), and more likely to be female (p=0.0079) and Caucasian (p=0.0096) than patients without psychiatric history. The depression cohort of this study also had significantly higher triglyceride levels (p= 0.0492) than any other psychiatric diagnosis cohort, and the highest rates of hyperlipidemia (p = 0.012) and hypertension diagnoses (p = 0.0074) out of all cohorts, including the cohort of subjects never diagnosed with a psychiatric disorder. Conclusions: Patients undergoing weight reduction surgery seem to have high prevalence of depression and anxiety. Patients previously diagnosed with depression also appear to have a significantly higher rate of hypertension and hyperlipidemia than patients who were never diagnosed with a psychiatric disorder.