Bariatric Surgery: A New Hope for Treating Obesity
A 23-year-old man is reported to be healthy after undergoing the first super specialized weight loss surgery in eastern India, a doctor said.
Ritubrata Saha, 23, who had been obese since childhood, underwent the Laparoscopic Sleeve Gastrectomy here Aug 4.
Today, Saha is grinning ear to ear. The man finally hopes to shed his extra pounds - after paying Rs.250,000.
With seven percent of Indian children growing up as obese, the scourge is likely to hit hard the youth population.
But Bariatric surgery, also known as obesity or weight loss surgery, offers new hope for the obese.
"We tried everything from medicine to exercise but nothing worked. Ritubrata's food intake was little yet he kept gaining weight. Finally we opted for this surgery," Ritubrata's mother Soma Saha, a resident of Balasore in Orissa, told IANS.
B. Ramana, a noted laparoscopic and bariatric surgeon, operated on Ritubrata at the Apollo Gleneagles Hospital here.
"We followed the latest sleeve gastrectomy method whereby 60 to 80 percent of the stomach is removed and the shape of the stomach is changed to a tubular organ," Ramana said.
Gastric bypass surgery makes the stomach smaller and allows food to bypass part of the small intestines. The patient feels full more quickly, than when the stomach was its original size. This reduces the amount of food intake and thus the calories consumed.
The two-hour operation was followed by painless and rapid recovery.
"The effect of the surgery will be visible in six months. About 80 percent of the excess fat would be gone," Ramana added.
"Obesity is the other extreme of malnutrition," said Ramana, adding that at least 70 to 80 percent of fat adolescents grow up to be obese adults.
(Source: IANS)
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