The goal of Teen-LABS is to facilitate coordinated clinical, epidemiological and behavioral research in the field of adolescent bariatric surgery, through the cooperative development of common clinical protocols and a bariatric surgery database that will collect information from participating clinical centers performing bariatric surgery on teenagers.
Teen-LABS will help pool the necessary clinical expertise and administrative resources to facilitate the conduct of multiple clinical studies in a timely, efficient manner. Also, the use of standardized definitions, shared clinical protocols and data collection instruments will enhance investigators' ability to provide meaningful evidence-based recommendations for patient evaluation, selection and follow-up care.
In addition to investigating surgical outcomes, another broader goal of Teen-LABS is to better understand the etiology, pathophysiology, and behavioral aspects of severe obesity in youth and how this condition affects human beings over time.
In the 3rd five year cycle of funding for this project, several additional long-term research aims have been added, all in general alignment with the original aims of the project to assess efficacy and safety of bariatric surgery performed in adolescent years.
