Weight Loss Surgery or Bariatric Surgery(Gastric Bypass, Lap Band, Stomach Stapling)
The way people burn fat is that they take in fewer calories than they use. Weight loss surgery changes the anatomy of your stomach and intestines so that you are forced to eat less, or it causes your gastrointestinal tract to absorb less of the food you eat. These surgeries are major interventions and are generally a last resort after all other efforts of weight loss have failed. There are two main types of weight loss surgeries: restrictive and malabsorptive. The restrictive types of surgeries basically make it so that your stomach cannot hold as much food. This would cause you to eat less. The malabsorptive types of surgeries cause food to bypass part of your intestines. This causes less of the calories you eat to be absorbed by your body.
Before Weight Loss Surgery
Restrictive Surgeries Stomach
stapling (or gastroplasty) is where the surgeon will staple off part of
your stomach, leaving a smaller space for food to go after you swallow
it and before it reaches your intestines. This stomach stapling surgery
generally causes a person to lose 60% of his/her excess weight, but
much of that weight is regained in the next 5-10 years.
Stomach Stapling In the lap band weight
loss surgery, an inflatable band is place around part of the stomach.
This creates a pouch with a narrow opening. The pouch holds a smaller
amount of food than a normal stomach, and the narrow opening slows down
the rate at which food leaves the pouch and goes to the rest of your
stomach. This is a laparoscopic weight loss surgery, which means only small incisions are made. Therefore, it leaves you with smaller scars. The stomach band can also be adjustable by injecting or removing saline water through a port under the skin. This gives the pouch an opening that can be changed without have to do more surgery. The lap band procedure gives about a 35-50% loss of excess weight in the short term. The components can fail over time and there is a high rate of repeat surgeries needed to fix them. Also, of the people who have this procedure done a large percentages of them see improvements in or cures of some major diseases: 80% for diabetes, 70% for high blood pressure, and 60% for cholesterol levels. The lap band has the lowest risk of death with the procedure.
Lap Band Malabsorptive Surgeries These procedures change the connections of the intestines so the food only passes through some of your bowels. Intestines are not removed. They are still there. They are just bypassed by your food. This means not as many of the calories and nutrients that you eat can be absorbed by your body.
Gastric Bypass Combination Restrictive and Malabsorptive Surgery The technical name for this type of weight loss surgery is called proximal Roux-en-Y gastric bypass. That is quite a mouthful! The main point of this operation is that it causes you to eat less by causing you to have less room in your stomach and then causes your body to absorb fewer calories and nutrients because food bypasses a large part of your intestines. This surgery may have to be performed in two separate stages with the restrictive part being performed first to cause some initial weight loss and the malabsorptive part being done later. Initially, people lose about 65-75% of their excess weight. After 5 years, people end up with about a 50-60% excess weight reduction. In addition to weight loss, 90% of people see improvement in their diabetes and high blood pressure. 95% of people see improvement in their cholesterol levels.
Roux-en-Y Gastric Bypass A Quick Word about Liposuction The way
liposuction
works is a surgeon uses a probe to inject fat with saline and then
sucks the fat out of a person’s body. This can help give a person a
slimmer appearance. However, after undergoing this procedure, your risk
for heart disease does not go down and people with diabetes do not
improve their bodies’ ability to use insulin. These benefits are seen
with other weight loss methods. Therefore, liposuction is a cosmetic
procedure and not a way to improve your health. In order to achieve
these benefits, you need to shift the balance of your daily calories in
the direction of weight loss. ...Continue to Page 2 of Weight Loss Surgery Return to Home Page. It is important you discuss any weigh loss or exercise plan with your doctor. Only you and your physician can decide what is best for you. Some people have certain conditions that prevent them from doing all exercises, and goal body weights may be different for different people. You need to discuss all these things with your physician before starting any weight loss or exercise program. Dr. Vickery is not a surgeon. For more specifics on surgical procedures, contact a board certified bariatric surgeon. This article was written by John Vickery, MD. |
