According to a new study, adults who are mild to moderately overweight may benefit more from gastric banding—a minimally invasive weight loss surgery—than from drug therapy or behavioral changes, Australian researchers report.

While current weight loss surgery guidelines include patients who are seriously obese, modification of those guidelines can occur only if information is collected from patients with mild to moderate obesity, writes Dr. Paul E. O'Brien and colleagues in the Annals of Internal Medicine.

Australian researchers evaluated 80 patients who were mild to moderately overweight, had comorbid conditions, serious physical limitations, or psychosocial issues associated with their obesity, and who had made previous attempts at losing weight.

At random, 40 patients were put on a six-month diet, exercise, and drug therapy program with the weight loss drug orlistat.

The other 40 participants underwent gastric banding. Physicians regularly checked in with patients every four to six weeks, during which lifestyle changes were further encouraged. Only 33 patients in the non-surgical group and 39 patients in the surgical group competed the two-year study.

According to the results of the study, both groups had lost about the same amount of weight (13.8 percent) after a six months period.

However, after two years, patients who received gastric banding surgery lost about 21.6 percent of their initial weight and 87.2 percent of excess weight while the non-surgical group begun to gain weight after the six month period.

After two years, the non-surgical patients lost an average of 5.5 percent of their initial weight and 21.8 percent excess weight, a significantly lower amount than the surgical group.

Furthermore, a follow-up standard health and quality of life questionnaire revealed that gastric banding patients significantly improved in all eight domains of the survey after two years. The drug and behavioral therapy group only showed improvements in three domains.

Dr. Thomas A. Wadden and Dr. Adam Gilden Tsai of the University of Pennsylvania warn, however, that more information is needed on long-term results and costs before it can be determined which patients with mild to moderate obesity would benefit most from gastric surgery.

In addition, they state, “We need to expend far more resources on preventing these individuals, particularly children, from becoming obese.”