Table 1.
Baseline characteristics of patients seeking bariatric surgery by race and ethnicity
| Caucasian | African- American |
Hispanic | |
|---|---|---|---|
| (n = 432) | (n = 114) | (n = 76) | |
| Mean age | 45.6 | 42.4 | 37.2 |
| Mean BMI (kg/m2) | 46.5 | 49.3 | 47.2 |
| Sex | |||
| Male (%) | 27 | 13 | 25 |
| Female (%) | 73 | 87 | 75 |
| Education | |||
| High school or less (%) | 23 | 29 | 46 |
| Some college or 2-year degree (%) |
35 | 50 | 32 |
| 4-year college diploma or more (%) |
43 | 21 | 22 |
| Incomea | |||
| ≤$20,000 (%) | 12 | 32 | 39 |
| $20,001–$60,000 (%) | 27 | 47 | 38 |
| $60,001–$100,000 (%) | 27 | 16 | 15 |
| >$100,000 (%) | 34 | 6 | 8 |
| Insurance | |||
| Private (%) | 79 | 49 | 50 |
| Medicaid (%) | 8 | 33 | 39 |
| Medicare (%) | 9 | 16 | 8 |
| Other (%) | 4 | 2 | 3 |
| Co-morbidities | |||
| Diabetes (%) | 31 | 37 | 30 |
| Hypertension (%) | 55 | 60 | 45 |
| CAD/heart disease/stroke/ PVD (%) |
9 | 11 | 3 |
| Asthma (%) | 22 | 26 | 36 |
| Obstructive sleep apnea (%) |
50 | 39 | 42 |
| GERD (%) | 50 | 35 | 36 |
| Depression (%) | 55 | 41 | 62 |
| Anxiety (%) | 41 | 29 | 41 |
| Arthritis (%) | 30 | 27 | 22 |
| Chronic back pain (%) | 41 | 54 | 53 |
| Anemia (%) | 10 | 32 | 16 |
Results delineated in bold indicate statistically significant differences across the variable by specified race/ethnicity group compared to Caucasian at p < 0.05. We used t tests to compare differences in means for continuous variables and Wald χ2 tests for differences in proportions between Caucasian and AA and between Caucasian and Hispanic patients
a
There were 22 patients who did not report an income on the survey, and were not included in the percentages for income