A recent study from the Mayo Clinic examined the relationship between clinical outcome and obesity in elbow replacement patients. The Mayo Clinic has the most extensive experience with elbow replacement in the world. They studied a large group of patients and approximately one quarter of these patients met the definition of obesity.
Overall obese patients had more complications, shorter average survival of the implants, and increased rates of failure of total elbow replacement compared to non obese patients.
The take-home message for patients here is that obesity has adverse effects not only on cardiovascular health but significantly impacts your risk in scenarios such as elbow replacement.
Repeat elbow replacements are very challenging. we do not know if losing weight after one gets an elbow replacement improves odds of implant longevity and performance. But this is further proof that there are more reasons than ever to keep your body weight at a healthy level.