Is There Bias Against Bariatric Surgery for HIV Patients? A Survey of Medical Student Perceptions

Erin B Fennern, MD, MPH¹, Juliana Taney, MD², Linda Zhang, MD¹. ¹The Mount Sinai Hospital, ²University of Chicago

Introduction: For many patients, HIV has transformed from a life-threatening illness into a manageable chronic disease. Reflecting trends in the general population, obesity is increasingly prevalent among HIV-positive patients. Surgical intervention has shown the greatest effectiveness in treating obesity. It is unknown, however, whether physician attitudes reflect the changing trends in obesity care for HIV-positive patients.

Methods and Procedures: Medical students from the first, second, and fourth years of training were invited to participate in an IRB-approved survey, handed out during didactic sessions, which was designed to assess their knowledge and attitudes regarding bariatric surgery in HIV-positive patients. Self-reported demographic information of respondents was also collected. The outcome of interest was the proportion of correct responses. Univariate and multivariate regression analyses were performed.

Results: Surveys were completed by 127 medical students. Demographic covariates included the following: age, sex, race, BMI, and year of training. Age, sex, race, and BMI were not statistically significant in the multivariate model. However, in both univariate and multivariate models, each additional year of training was associated with a significant increase in the proportion of correct responses (multivariate model beta coefficient = 0.440, p <0.001).

Conclusions: Obese and HIV-positive patients suffer from well-documented stigma in health care. These findings suggest that medical training corrects common misperceptions of obese and HIV-positive patients, and may lead to a better understanding of the appropriateness of bariatric surgery for HIV patients. Whether these attitudes are predictive of referral practices remains to be seen.

Presented at the SAGES 2017 Annual Meeting in Houston, TX.

Abstract ID: 88186

Program Number: P591

Presentation Session: iPoster Session (Non CME)

Presentation Type: Poster