Gastric balloon helping obese Kiwis get their lives back

GASTRIC BALLOON WEIGHT LOSS 10-15kg From $8500

A morbidly obese man who could walk no more than 20m at a time can now live a normal life thanks to a new weight-loss treatment introduced to New Zealand in 2015.

The Orbera gastric balloon has been used to treat more than 100 people since it was introduced less than three years ago as a safer, less intrusive option than gastric bands.

Gastroenterologist Dr Ravinder Ogra, of Flat Bush’s Ormiston Hospital, had done 45 balloon procedures by May this year but his first patient was one of his most successful.

When Ogra first saw the 55-yearold in 2015, he weighed 219kg, took six tablets and two doses of insulin a day to control his diabetes, had major blood-pressure issues and had to rest after walking 10m to 20m.

Bariatric surgeons had refused to operate because of the dangers of treating someone with so many complicating factors caused by his 1 2 weight. But the Orbera gastric balloon had just been approved for use and did not require full surgery.

It works by being inserted down the throat and into the stomach, where it is inflated with saline solution and left for about six months.

The man agreed to the procedure and lost 54kg. He no longer depended on insulin to control his diabetes and could run his business full time again.

Since then, he has had two other balloons inserted and plans a fourth.

His weight had fluctuated between treatments, hitting 158kg at his lightest, although leading up to his fourth procedure he weighs 190kg — still 29kg less than his original weight.

Ogra said the balloons had been a hugely successful in helping obese people lose weight. Of the 45 he had implanted, only three had had to be removed early — two people found they could not tolerate one and the balloon had no effect for the third.

The average weight of his patients before the procedure was 133kg and the average weight loss was 16.2kg.

Ogra said it was originally thought the balloon made you feel full faster because it took up space in the stomach but it seemed the real reason was that the balloon delayed the emptying of your stomach.

Ogra stressed that while the procedure had worked wonders for some, the patient still needed to do a lot of work.

While the balloon did help to change the body’s metabolism, the lifestyle change had to continue after it was removed which was why each of Ogra’s patients also saw a nurse, dietician and psychologist.

Two other New Zealand centres also offer the procedure.

Alasdair Patrick, director of Remuera’s MacMurray Centre, started offering it last year and had treated more than 50 patients by May with a further 25 scheduled to start.

Those patients had seen an average weight loss of 10-15kg, he said.

Patrick said only patients with a body mass index (BMI) between 30 and 40 were eligible for treatment at the MacMurray Centre but Ogra said Ormiston Hospital had no strict limit. Ogra had treated patients with BMIs ranging from 30 and 94.

Christchurch Weight Loss has also done a handful of Orbera procedures.

However, the US Food and Drug Administration issued a warning about such devices last August, saying there had been seven unexpected deaths in patients with liquid-filled intragastric balloon systems over 18 months — five of them with the Orbera system.

Patrick defended the safety of the product, saying they were five cases out of 277,000 and none was definitively due to the procedure.