Informed Consent

Before undergoing a life-changing procedure, people pursing bariatric surgery should be fully informed of medical, psychological, and behavioral risks–in addition to the behavioral, nutritional, and social changes they are likely to experience post-operatively. Patient education materials can be developed to guide conversations between patients and providers about these risks and outcomes, as well as to document that these important conversations took place. Each program will have key points of informed consent they wish to cover in their pre-operative visits. While most programs will approach informed consent in a uniform way for each patient, it can help to augment the process with more detailed discussion about topics of particular relevance to any one patient. This section contains information that can assist healthcare professionals in creating patient education materials to be provided throughout the informed consent process. As individual programs differ, these resources are not all-encompassing and should be tailored to each program’s needs.