Procedures
Special Information for PatientsBariatric surgery is a generic medical term which involves several types of surgical techniques to reduce the food intake capacity and modify the intestinal path to avoid fat absorption during the digestive process of a given patient.
Under that context, there are two basic approaches that can be followed to achieve optimum results.
Restrictive Approach
The main focus of this method is to decrease food intake by reducing the stomach size. The following techniques are included into this category:
Intragastric Balloon
It is a high resistance silicone bag, designed to provide short-term weight loss therapy for up to 6 months, after which it must be removed.
The risk of balloon deflation and intestinal obstruction (and therefore possible death) is significantly higher when balloon are left in place longer than 6 months.
Adjustable Gastric Band
The Adjustable Gastric Band simply acts like a let around the top portion of your stomach, creating a small pouch.
As the digestion process remains normal, since the digestive system anatomy has not been modified, the band only helps you to reduce weight by restricting the amount of the food you eat.
Vertical Ring Gastroplasty
Another type of restrictive surgery, in simple terms is an operation during which the stomach is reduced in size using special staples, in order to restrict food intake and thus cause weight loss.
Unfortunately, the use of staples in this way has one big drawback. The stomach wall tends to stretch. This was why stomach stapling operations proved ineffective.
Sleeve Gastrectomy
The sleeve gastrectomy is an operation in which the left side of the stomach is surgically removed.
This results in a new stomach which is roughly the size and shape of a banana.
Since this operation does not involve any “rerouting” or reconnecting of the intestines, it is qualified as a simple operation. This technique reduces the sizes of the stomach by about 80%. It is divided vertically from top to bottom leaving a banana shaped stomach along the inside curve.
Gastric Threads
In this procedure the stomach is applied over itself, without being modified or cut. The tissues act over themselves simulating a gastric sleeve, in the search for the same effects of this type of procedure.
Combined Approach of Restriction and Malabsorption
It focuses on reducing the stomach size and modifying the intestinal path, so the food is partially digested, avoiding the absorption of fat and calories. The following techniques are included into this category.
Gastric Bypass. (Recommended Procedure)
Considered the standard surgery against which the other ones had to be compared, it has been performed in countless patients during the last 34 years.
Along this time many details have been improved turning this technique into the safest and effective way to obtain permanent weight loss with excellent life quality.
Biliopancreatic Diversion
This type of surgery was designed for severe obesity cases. It restricts both food intake and the amount of calories the body absorbs.
Most of the fat and carbohydrate eaten passes through the body without being absorbed. This has the effect that the patient is less restricted in their eating because fats and sugars are not absorbed by the intestine.
The stomach is segmented upper outside curve to the lower inside curve and in the beginning of the small intestine. The resulting portion is totally removed. Due to this fact, this surgery once executed, cannot be undone.
Duodenal Switch
Highly effective, this type surgery creates two separate pathways and one common pathway in which the contents of the two main paths are mixed before emptying into the large intestine.
The objective of this arrangement is to reduce the amount of time the body has to capture calories from food in the small intestine and to selectively limit the absorption of fat.
The stomach is divided vertically from top to bottom leaving a banana shaped stomach along the inside curve. The original volume of this organ is reduced by about 80%.
