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More than 2.5 billion adults worldwide are overweight or obese. Many develop type 2 diabetes (T2D) and other complications.
Bariatric surgery is an effective treatment option for significantly reducing weight and reducing the risk of complications. However, it is still difficult to predict the benefits of bariatric surgery for people without T2D. Researchers from Germany, France and Italy investigated whether differences in metabolic improvements could be identified in people from different diabetes risk subtypes.
They analyzed two cohorts of people who underwent bariatric surgery and a control group . The study is published in the journal Diabetes Care . Classification into diabetes risk subtypes before bariatric surgery First, overweight people without T2D but at risk of diabetes (defined by an increased BMI, among other things) were assigned to the various diabetes risk subtypes.
"People with obesity who belong to subtypes 3, 5 and 6 have the highest risk of developing T2D and/or comorbidities," explains DZD researcher Leontine Sandforth from the University Hospital of Tübingen. Together with Violeta Raverdy from the University of Lille, she is the first author of the publication. Subtype 4 includes people who are overweight/obese with a low risk of diabetes.
Subtypes 1, 2 and 3 usually have little or no excess weight and a lower risk of diabetes. People in a cohort from Lille (France) and a cohort from Rome (Italy) underwent bariatric surgery. A control cohort in Tübingen (Germany) received a lifestyle intervention with behavioral change.
To determine the success of the intervention, glucose regulation, prediabetes remission (normalization of glucose regulation), liver fat, insulin resistance and beta cell function were examined. High-risk subtypes benefit significantly from bariatric surgery The results: People with high-risk subtypes 5 and 6 benefited the most from bariatric surgery. Beta cell function and insulin sensitivity improved.
In addition, blood sugar levels normalized (prediabetes remission) and liver fat was reduced. Moreover, the majority of high-risk groups transitioned to low-risk groups after bariatric surgery. This was not the case in the control cohort with lifestyle change counseling.
Although relative weight loss was similar across all subtypes, surprisingly, participants from low-risk subtype 4 had a lower remission rate of prediabetes and thus benefited less in terms of improvement in blood sugar regulation. "Our results show the relevance of the prediabetes classification for people with severe obesity. We were able to identify different reactions of the subtypes to bariatric surgery," says Prof.
Dr. Reiner Jumpertz von Schwartzenberg. "These findings could help to advance precision medicine approaches in bariatric surgery .
" More information: Leontine Sandforth et al, Subphenotype-Dependent Benefits of Bariatric Surgery for Individuals at Risk for Type 2 Diabetes, Diabetes Care (2025). DOI: 10.2337/dc25-0160.
