The causes of obesity can be various; from metabolic disorders, hereditary diseases, thyroid and an excess intake of carbohydrate and fat based foods. Prefabricated foods with a high sugar content are the main cause of obesity in most patients.
Dr. Alonso, a specialist in general surgery, explains that a high degree of obesity can lead to the need for surgical treatment, since it is not possible to reduce excess body fat with a diet alone. This type of obesity can become morbid and requires treatment due to the risk of developing joint, gonadal, dermatological and metabolic ailments, such as hypertension, hypercholesterolemia and diabetes, which is the most feared.
What does the treatment of obesity consist of?
Treatment can be started with diets when the patient has a body mass index between 30 and 35. Above this index, other measures are necessary to prevent the patient from developing a metabolic syndrome with an increase in cholesterol, triglycerides and abdominal perimeter. It can also increase the risk of cardiovascular disease, hypertension and diabetes.
The gastric balloon is the least invasive technique that can be used to treat obesity and must always be accompanied by a healthy diet. With this procedure it is possible to lose up to 20kg, although there is a risk of a rebound effect, i.e. the patient can regain the weight lost after treatment.
Other techniques can be the duodenal sheath, Apollo and POSE, but they are valid for two to three years and there is also a risk of rebound effect after the procedure. If the patient has a body mass index higher than 35 the best option is bariatric surgery, performed through procedures such as tubular gastrectomy and gastric bypass, indicated when the index is higher than 50.
Diabetes surgery
The treatment of diabetes by surgery is performed with a shorter gastric bypass than the one used for body mass reduction. The purpose is to establish a short circuit between the stomach so that the food content does not pass through the duodenum. Therefore, the junction must be made at less than one meter.
It does not require gastric restriction and, therefore, it is a surgery that is not aimed at weight loss. It is performed to reduce the insulin requirement of a patient with type 1 diabetes, as they need between 60 and 100 units of insulin, which can lead to the development of pathologies such as retinopathy or nephropathy. Some of them may end up on dialysis and even suffer from blindness and renal failure. In addition, these patients must not have exceeded 10 to 15 years of insulin treatment to be able to undergo this type of surgery.