Preoperative predictors of adherence to multidisciplinary follow-up care postbariatric surgery.

Background: Long-term multidisciplinary care after bariatric surgery is important for weight maintenance and management of co-morbidities. Despite this, the rate of attendance to follow-up appointments is universally low.

Objective: To identify patient factors that contribute to adherence to follow-up care after bariatric surgery.

Setting: Three university-affiliated hospitals in Canada

Methods: A cohort study of 388 patients who underwent bariatric surgery from January 2011 to December 2011 was performed. This program mandates multidisciplinary follow-up care at 3, 6, and 12 months, and annually thereafter. Patients' socioeconomic, psychosocial, and medical and psychiatric co-morbidities were recorded prospectively. Adherence to follow-up care was defined as having attended the majority of clinic visits (3 or 4 out of 4); all other patients were considered nonadherent.

Results: The mean age of patients was 45.0 years, 81.2% were female, and the majority underwent a gastric bypass (91.8%) versus a sleeve gastrectomy (8.2%); 62.1% of patients were adherent to follow-up appointments. Patients older than 25 years had a higher adherence rate than those who were younger (63.2% versus 37.5%, P = .040). Patients with full-time or part-time employment had a significantly higher adherence rate than those who were unemployed or retired (65.6% versus 50.0%, P = .017, odds ratio 1.9). Patients with obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) before surgery had higher follow-up adherence than those without OSA (62.2% versus 37.8%, P = .044). In multivariate analysis, employment remained an independent predictor of follow-up adherence (P = .017).

Conclusion: Employment was the strongest predictor of attendance to follow-up clinic. Patients with OSA and older patients were also more likely to return consistently for scheduled follow-up.