What are My Weight Loss
Surgery Options?
There are several weight loss surgery types. Only your
weight loss surgeon can tell you which weight loss surgery
option is right for you. Weight loss surgery options include
the following:
The concept of gastric surgery to
control obesity grew out of results of
operations for cancer or severe ulcers
that removed large portions of the
stomach or small intestine. Because
patients undergoing these procedures
tended to lose weight after surgery,
some doctors began to use such
operations to treat severe obesity. The
first operation that was widely used for
severe obesity was a type of intestinal
bypass. This operation, first used 40
years ago, caused weight loss through
malabsorption (decreased ability to
absorb nutrients from food because the
intestines were removed or bypassed).
Surgeons now use other techniques
that produce weight loss primarily by
limiting how much the stomach can hold.
Two types of surgical procedures used to
promote weight loss are:
- Restrictive surgery:
During these procedures the stomach
is made smaller. A section of your
stomach is removed or closed, which
limits the amount of food it can
hold and causes you to feel full.
- Malabsorptive surgery:
Most of digestion and absorption
takes place in the small intestine.
Surgery to this area shortens the
length of the small intestine and/or
changes where it connects to the
stomach, limiting the amount of food
that is completely digested or
absorbed (causing malabsorption).
These surgeries are now performed
along with restrictive surgery.
Through food intake restriction,
malabsorption, or a combination of both,
you can lose weight since less food
either goes into your stomach or stays
in your small intestine long enough to
be digested and absorbed.
Can Weight Loss Surgery Help
Me with Type 2 Diabetes, Cancer, or High Blood Pressure?
Study after study shows that weight loss surgery reduces
the incidence of weight-related diseases such as type 2
diabetes and certain cancers, and in the case of diabetes,
often reverses or eliminates the disease entirely. In
studies, up to 77% of patients with type 2 diabetes saw a
complete reversal of their disease after having weight loss
surgery.
