LARSEN, JUNILLA K., RINIE GEENEN, CORA MAAS, PIETER DE WIT, TINY VAN ANTWERPEN, NICO BRAND, AND BERT VAN RAMSHORST. Personality as a predictor of weight loss maintenance after surgery for morbid obesity. Obes Res. 2004;12:1828 -1834. Objective: Personality characteristics are assumed to underlie health behaviors and, thus, a variety of health outcomes. Our aim was to examine prospectively whether personality traits predict short-and long-term weight loss after laparoscopic adjustable gastric banding. Research Methods and Procedures:Of patients undergoing laparoscopic adjustable gastric banding, 168 (143 women, 25 men, 18 to 58 years old, mean 37 years, preoperative BMI 45.9 Ϯ 5.6 kg/m 2 ) completed the Dutch Personality Questionnaire on average 1.5 years before the operation. The relationship between preoperative personality and short-and long-term postoperative weight loss was determined using multilevel regression analysis. Results: The average weight loss of patients progressively increased to 10 BMI points until 18 months after surgery and stabilized thereafter. A lower baseline BMI, being a man, and a higher educational level were associated with a lower weight loss. None of the personality variables was associated with weight outcome at short-term follow-up. Six of seven personality variables did not predict long-term weight outcome. Egoism was associated with less weight loss in the long-term postoperative period. The effect sizes of the significant predictions were small. Discussion: None of the personality variables predicted short-term weight outcome, and only one variable showed a small and unexpected association with long-term weight outcome that needs confirmation. This suggests that personality assessment as intake psychological screening is of little use for the prediction of a poor or successful weight outcome after bariatric surgery.

LAGB could be a long-term solution to morbid obesity with regard to both weight and QoL outcome. The findings of our study emphasize the importance of including social QoL variables in outcome research. They further suggest that when the follow-up duration increases, especially in patients who are single, intervention and consultation should be simultaneously directed at weight and psychosocial variables.

Postoperative psychosocial quality is at a level that may be expected to motivate patients to consolidate the surgically established weight reduction, but attention should be paid to the physical condition. Since the relative gain in quality of life as experienced by patients tends to be evaluated less with a longer duration of the postoperative interval, the risk of relapse may increase with passage of time.