Teens who have obesity surgery lose as much weight as those who have the operation as adults and are more likely to have other health problems, such as diabetes and high blood pressure, go away, a study says.

The results suggest there’s a benefit from not waiting to address obesity. Researchers say longer study is still needed to know lifetime effects of this radical surgery and that it’s a personal decision whether and when to try it.

The study was published Thursday by the New England Journal of Medicine and presented at the Combating Childhood Obesity conference in Houston. The National Institutes of Health paid for it, and some of the researchers consult for makers of obesity surgery tools.

The damaging effects of obesity accumulate, and the risk of developing other diseases and dying prematurely rises the longer someone goes. Surgery is usually reserved for people who can’t lose enough weight through diet, exercise and sometimes medicines — and are severely obese.

Researchers led by Dr. Thomas Inge at the University of Colorado compared results from two studies of gastric bypass surgery in 161 teens and 396 adults who had been obese since they were teens.

Diabetes went into remission in 86% of teens and 53% of adults who had that disease before their operations; high blood pressure did the same in 68% of teens and 41% of adults.

Some side effects were more common in teens, and they were twice as likely to need a second operation.