A new study advises women who have undergone bariatric surgery for weight loss to wait at least three years afterward before attempting to become pregnant.
Those were the results of a 33-year retrospective study published this week in JAMA Surgery.
The reasons: complications.
Compared with infants from the general population, infants from mothers with a bariatric-surgery history were at higher risk for perinatal complications – namely prematurity, intensive care unit admission, and low birth weight, data indicated.
It is during the first three years, post-op, when these risks diminish over time.
“This is new information that can help inform counseling for bariatric patients,” said corresponding author Dr. Brodie Parent, a general surgery resident at the University of Washington School of Medicine.