Clinical outcome of patients undergoing abdominoplasty after massive weight loss

Abstract Background Abdominoplasty is one of the most commonly performed surgical procedures in patients who have undergone massive weight loss to reshape the body contour. Objectives This study was undertaken to assess the clinical outcome, complication rates and risk factors for complications of patients undergoing abdominoplasty after massive weight loss. Setting and Method: Clinical outcome was retrospectively analysed in 121 patients, who have undergone abdominoplasty. The retrospective analysis included demographic data of patients such as sex, age, body mass index (BMI) and pre-existing illnesses of subjects. Moreover, postoperative complications including seroma, hematoma, wound infection and tissue necrosis were analysed. Results In our study cohort, the median age was 43,7 years, the median body weight was 94,7 kg and the median BMI was 32,3 kg/m 2 . Majority of included patients were women (70.3%). Death occurred in none of the patients. Among individuals, wound infection occurred in 3.3%, tissue necrosis in 1.7%, seroma in 7.4%, and hematoma in 3.3% of patients during the postoperative course. Reoperations were necessary in two subjects (1.7%) due to postoperative bleeding and tissue necrosis of the navel. Tissue necrosis was significantly more often seen in a subset individual with type II diabetes (p=0.006). Moreover, the rate of reoperations was significantly higher in patients with cardiovascular pre-existing illnesses as compared to cardiovascular healthy patients (p=0.036). Multivariate analysis analysing risk factors for postoperative complications including sex, age, BMI, diabetes, pulmonary disease and cardiovascular disease revealed strong independent relevance for type II diabetes (p=0.024). Conclusions We found that abdominoplasty is a safe operative procedure. In addition, the risk for complications in significantly increased in the subgroup of diabetic patients and patients with cardiovascular diseases.