SURGICAL PROCEDURES
Patients who are morbidly or severely obese are at increased risk for health problems and tend to have a shortened life span. There is also added potential risk from continued weight increase. The risk of severe obesity is greater than that of its surgical treatments. Persons eligible for weight loss surgery include the following:
โ
-
Persons at least 70 pounds above ideal body weight.
-
Persons who are at least 50 pounds over weight and have life-threatening obesity related problems such as diabetes, hypertension, sleep apnea, etc.
โ
Surgery has become an acceptable method of treatment for clinically severe obesity because it appears to be the only option which can provide long-term maintained weight loss in-patients with clinically severe obesity. In fact, the number of patients having surgical treatment of obesity has doubled in recent years. Stomach, or gastric operations, have been preformed since 1969. Currently, the two leading approaches to weight-loss surgery in the United States are Roux-en-Y gastric bypass and adjustable gastric banding. Vertical banded gastroplasty, or stomach stapling, is less commonly performed today. Obesity surgeons should be skilled in more than one surgical approach as the specific procedure needs to be carefully matched to the individual patient.
โ
The bariatric surgery cost or lap band surgery cost is best discussed with your doctor during a consultation.
GASTRIC SLEEVE
Sleeve gastrectomy is a new procedure that induces weight loss by restricting food intake. With this procedure, the surgeon removes approximately 80% of the stomach laparoscopically so that the stomach takes the shape of a tube or "sleeve." This reduces the amount of food it takes to get full and also significantly decreases hunger. Digestion and absorption of nutrients is not affected and stays the same
GASTRIC BYPASS
Nearly 140,000 of these procedures are performed in America every year. Gastric bypass works in two ways: restriction and malabsorption.
Restriction of large amounts of food
The stomach is stapled to create a small ‘gastric pouch’ that is connected to the rest of the small intestine. This reduces the actual size of the ‘functional’ stomach from about 400 ml to a mere 15 to20 ml and limits the amount of food consumed at one time, therefore ‘restricting’ food intake.
โ