Living with obesity means that a person’s excess weight poses a serious health risk; bariatric surgery is currently the only consistently effective treatment for severe obesity. For both insured & uninsured patients, there are out-of-pocket costs associated with surgery, which can often stop people from seeking treatment that they need.
Let’s look at bariatric surgery as an investment in your future self, and how many years it will take to get a return on your investment. The return on your investment, through commitment to diet and lifestyle changes, is not just in monetary terms but in your overall quality of life as you transition to a healthier, happier you.
But here are four ways that bariatric surgery can save you real money, long-term.
1. Reduce Food Costs
Your Shopping Bill
This one probably seems pretty obvious but it’s important to consider, especially with increasing inflation and cost of living. Bariatric surgery (gastric sleeve, gastric bypass, gastric band etc) limits the amount of food that you can consume, your post-surgery diet includes healthy meals and no high-calorie snacks or drinks. How much would you save a week if you weren’t buying snacks, were just drinking water and only eating small meals?
Eating Out
It’s not just your shopping bill that would see the benefits, but you would also save money when eating out, whether that’s ordering a takeaway or meeting friends at a restaurant. You won’t want to, and physically won’t be able to eat the portions that you used to. You will also have the knowledge of what is important to eat nutritionally, regardless of whether you prepared the meal or are eating out which will actually increase the range of foods you can select even though the amount reduces.
Foods that are high in saturated fats or sugar can cause nausea following surgery and are low in nutrition and high in calories, so are best avoided. How much money would you save a week if you weren’t eating out as much, or only ordered an entree rather than indulge in three courses?
2. Medication Costs
Losing weight is an effective treatment for the medical conditions that obesity causes. The majority of the significant diseases that people living with obesity suffer from, such as diabetes, hypertension, high cholesterol, sleep apnoea and depression are either controlled or significantly improved by weight loss.
Bariatric surgery is an effective way of putting type 2 diabetes into remission. People with type 2 diabetes have twice the medical expenses as a person without diabetes (CDC), and the costs only increase as things become more complex. This example is just one of many that demonstrate the medication savings that the one-off cost of surgery will have in a person’s lifetime.
3. Medical Care Costs
If you want to know what those excess kilos are doing to your body, we have listed all of the conditions that are associated with obesity here. Each of these conditions, or a combination, all incur ongoing medical care. Even with subsidised care, there are still transport costs to get to and from multiple appointments, and the time that this takes. Valuable time that could be spent doing more meaningful activities.
Obesity surgery has been established internationally for more than 20 years as the best method for sustained weight loss in severely obese people. Patients who miss out on surgery die at a younger age and have many more medical conditions and medical costs than those who undergo surgery. Patients who wait until they have permanent conditions such as serious diabetes, renal failure, heart attacks or cancer have worse outcomes if they choose surgery in desperation.
Choosing to invest in bariatric surgery now, can save you not only your future medical care costs, operations, treatments, equipment or in-home care, but also help create a future that has a better quality of life and overall health.
4. Employment opportunities
People with significant weight problems take more sick days, are more likely to retire early because of illness, and are more likely to be “locked out” of jobs because of physical constraints or because of insidious obesity stigma that reduces employment prospects and promotions for many. Adding years to your life also means adding years to your “working life”, be it in a career where you are paid, or in active, busy years
Why you should invest in bariatric surgery – investing in your future
Bariatric surgery is life-changing and life-saving – can you really afford not to have surgery? Whether you take the first step today or arrange for your surgery 12 months from now, the real cost of not having surgery is the increased risk to life. Not just the length of your life, but the quality of those days/weeks/years/decades.
At Upper GI Surgery our obesity treatment is patient-centred. Our expert team can discuss your options in full, from weight loss medication to different bariatric surgery procedures, complete with how much this will cost as an investment into your future. How much could you save if you were living your new, healthier, happier life?
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