Assessing Sexual Abuse/Attack Histories with Bariatric Surgery Patients

Abstract

This study assessed sexual abuse/attack histories in 573 [corrected] bariatric surgery patients using the PsyBari. The prevalence rates found were lower (15.5%, 19.3% of women, 5.2% of men) than other studies that used bariatric surgery patients but consistent with studies that used nonbariatric obese subjects. Furthermore, bariatric surgery patients who disclosed sexual abuse/attack were more likely to disclose physical abuse, psychological problems, psychological treatment, psychiatric medication, and psychiatric hospitalization. Among bariatric surgery patients who disclosed sexual abuse/attack, females were more likely to disclose suicidal ideation. A logistic regression found that for females, physical abuse and suicidal ideation reliably predicted abuse/attack status. For males, psychological problems, psychiatric medications, hospitalization, and suicidal ideation, reliably predicted abuse/attack status.

Prevalence and Predictors of Self-Reported Sexual Abuse in Severely Obese Patients in a Population-Based Bariatric Program

“…As obesity severity increases, the self-reported prevalence of sexual abuse as well as other psychosocial issues rises, although this is not a consistent finding [8–11]. Previous studies examining the prevalence of sexual abuse in severely obese patients seeking bariatric care have reported a 16–32% prevalence of sexual abuse [12, 13], compared to approximately 4–20% in the general population [14–16]. A recent meta-analysis of childhood sexual abuse with 10 million subjects estimates the worldwide prevalence to be 13% [17]; similarly, Canadian studies suggest that self-reported sexual abuse during childhood and adolescence occurred in 4% of males and 13% of females [16].…”

Clinical Practice Recommendations for the Management of Obesity in the United Arab Emirates

“…substance-related disorders, physical abuse and suicidal ideations [45,46,47]. Substance-related disorders such as alcohol abuse pose a particular risk as they exacerbate the lack of coping skills [48] and control.…”

Rethinking the Preoperative Psychological Evaluation – A New Paradigm for Improved Outcomes and Predictive Power

“…Recently, others have proposed the utilization and exploration of more newly developed instruments such as the Personality Assessment Inventory (PAI - Corsica, Azarbad, McGill, Wool, & Hood, 2010), the PsyBari (Mahony, 2010), and the Revised Master Questionnaire (Corsica, Hood, Azarbad, & Ivan, 2011). Corsica et al demonstrated that the PAI has sound psychometric properties for use with the bariatric population (Corsica et al, 2010).…”

“…The PsyBari is a self-report survey comprised of questions designed to assess constructs that were thought by the author and "other bariatric surgery professionals" to be important to measure preoperatively (Mahony, 2010). These include surgical motivation, emotional eating, anger, binge eating, obesity-related depression, weight-related social impairment, knowledge of postsurgical dietary restrictions, substance/alcohol abuse, and surgical anxiety.…”

“…In order to accomplish this, we first need to establish a systematized way of selecting information related to these prediction variables. While several practitioners have published standardized clinical assessments (Mahony, 2010;Sogg & Mori, 2004;Wadden & Foster, 2006), the information determined important continues to be based largely on clinical convention and not systematically tied to an empirical basis. Empirical evidence without an overarching framework prohibits a broader understanding of relationships among complex determinants and the outcome(s) of interest, and thus does little to guide clinical practice (Green, 2000).…”