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Essay on Surgical Treatments for Obesity and Weight Management

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Surgical Treatments for Obesity and Weight Management

Obesity is a growing problem in America. Despite the abundance of diets, weight loss drugs, and miracle exercise products Americans continue to gain weight. Most obese individuals have tried each of these weight loss methods before without any success. What, if any, are their options? This paper will review new surgical treatments for obesity and weight management; gastric banding and vertical banded gastroplasty. It will look at the procedure, the rationale, effectiveness, complications and lifestyle changes that follow gastric banding procedures.

Gastric banding and vertical banded gastroplasty seek to promote weight loss in the …show more content…

These surgical procedures seek to advocate weight loss through the severe restriction of food intake. The food pouch only hold between 1-3 ml of food, which is equivalent to about ½ of a cup at any one meal. This amount of food can be ingested without discomfort and will give a feeling of satiation. Any amount of food over this limit will be expelled from the person almost immediately and cause great feelings of discomfort. The theory is that by restricting food intake and providing the feeling of satiation much more quickly, that obese people will be able to finally lose the weight necessary to maintain good health. After the first several weeks on a liquid diet, the person can resume normal eating habits that are within the intake range.

Many Internet sites and doctors who perform these procedures tout these gastric banding procedures as the most effective way to lose weight and maintain weight loss for the obese patient. They claim that there are few if any complications and that almost all patients are able to meet and sustain their weight loss goals. On the surface it looks like these new surgical procedures are the best method of weight loss for the obese patient, but it sound like this is too good to be true. The next sections of this paper will try and determine whether these claims about effectiveness and complications are true, and whether there are significant lifestyle changes that must take

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